Chapter Text
Penelope had no idea how she was going to talk to him again.
Sitting around in her English class, having already finished her work and hearing everybody talk to each-other as they were supposed to finish theirs, she pondered on all the possibilities she could take and came to the upsetting conclusion that it wasn’t really looking all that good for her.
She tried to think of ways to talk to him again but all of them were strange and if she ever attempted to do any of them, she was afraid Andromache would send her to a mental hospital as quickly as she would tell her the ideas.
Penelope didn’t know what to do.
She didn’t want to look too desperate, but by the gods, Clytemnestra was right. She was incredibly desperate, even though she never wanted to admit it.
The only way she could possibly talk to him again was in history class, but she didn’t think sitting next to him would do her any good because it would only make her look even more of a creep than she already was and it would only frighten him further.
What was worse about all of this was that Odysseus probably believed she only wanted to talk to him in order to make fun of her or something strange like that, when in fact it was the complete opposite. She couldn’t communicate this to him without sounding completely deranged and so she needed to find a way to make the situation as comfortable as it could possibly be so Odysseus wouldn’t have to keep up his front.
They were getting somewhere. They were.
If only Menelaus hadn’t come and stopped it from happening.
She would have cursed his name in her mind if she wasn’t feeling so bad for him. There was nothing she could do. He came and he went and he asked and he probably told Helen and Clytemnestra but they haven’t talked to her about it yet so either they’re waiting for the perfect opportunity or the conversation hadn’t come up yet and they did not in fact know that Penelope was caught talking to Odysseus. She hoped for the latter, but Palamedes being in the bunch of people who just had to ruin her first moment of connection with Odysseus didn’t make her all too hopeful about the outcome.
Thank the gods above she hadn’t seen either of them in her classes today. If she had, then she would have probably been thoroughly questioned and then asked why she hadn’t told them in the first place. She probably should have, but in her defense, they didn’t support her crushing on Odysseus and so she wanted to keep it to herself.
And Andromache, of course, but that was another story.
She knew how they would react, she knew how Clytemnestra would just start cursing him and his whole bloodline out at that moment and she didn’t want to hear it. Helen would only sit and laugh and contribute her own words here and there, but she ultimately agreed with Clytemnestra, even though she was willing to help Penelope get together with him.
But she didn’t particularly want Helen’s help. Not when she was dealing with her own issues but especially not due to Helen and Clytemnestra’s very close proximity. They couldn’t keep anything from each-other and Penelope knew that the moment she said anything to Helen, the words would go straight to Clytemnestra and then she would be utterly doomed.
Stupid Menelaus. Why did he have to come at that exact moment?
A part of her almost believed it was planned in some way. How could Menelaus know where she would be in that exact moment? No, what was she thinking? She was being silly now.
Menelaus couldn’t have possibly known about the pencil throwing. Agamemnon and Palamedes couldn’t have known either, not when there wasn’t anybody whom they were friends with in that class except for Penelope herself.
It wasn’t a large class as it was. Word couldn’t have gotten out.
Nobody speaks to Odysseus except a few select people Penelope’s forgotten now, but they know how hated he is and they know all of the gossip her friends have spread about him so they choose to steer clear of him as much as possible.
It wasn’t really hard to do so. She barely saw Odysseus as it was.
Ever since that pencil throwing day, which has become a major source of embarrassment whenever she remembered it, a whole weekend had passed. A whole weekend to sit and wonder and think, but nothing came to mind.
Helen and Clytemnestra were busy all weekend helping Nausicaa and Briseis with some of their art and photography projects, so they didn’t really get a chance to see each other. Which, for the purposes of Penelope’s current infatuation and planning, was good.
Gods above. What was she supposed to do?
She had talked to her sister to try and find out if she had any relation to Odysseus’ sister at all, which she wasn’t really sure of because she was sure the eighth graders and the seventh graders had some sort of superiority complex against each other, but her sister hadn’t given her anything to work with.
Penelope didn’t know her name but when asking Iphthime, she didn’t seem all that focused on what she was talking about, and when Penelope tried to take the phone out of her hand she screamed and slapped her arms and sides trying to get it back.
She doesn’t even know what she’d do with the information anyway. Even if they weren’t friends, Penelope couldn’t go up to the seventh graders and become friends with her on the spot. The only thing it could offer her was a conversation starter with Odysseus, but the boy doesn’t even seem all that fond in talking to her anyway.
What was the point? Perhaps she should give up.
No, no she’s already put too much embarrassment on her head to give up now. She’s already spammed Andromache with links to videos and pins and music videos she imagines he listened to. She’s already thought too much about him to not do anything with it.
And Penelope didn’t like wasting her time.
When their teacher finally let them leave and she collected all her things, she walked out of the classroom and started walking in the busy halls and students piled out of their classes, creating an explosion of noise and laughter and gossip trailing through the hallways.
Now, it was lunch. She had to go find Helen and Clytemnestra in their own classes and then she had to go and find the rest of their friends and their usual table in the cafeteria.
And she would have done this exact thing, like she had done since the beginning of the school year, if she had not seen something that caught her eye.
The door to the chemistry classroom was closed. Everybody had probably left the class at that point and they were all on their way to lunch, which was obvious. She’s heard horror stories about this particular chemistry teacher from so many of Helen’s friends.
But from a fleeing glance to the square window of the door, she saw a peak of a particular boy she had been thinking about for too long of a time to admit.
Penelope felt her heart flutter in her chest. She skidded her walking to a slow pace, so slow in fact that she wasn’t moving at all. She stared into the small gap of the window within the door and saw Odysseus, lifting his head to talk to somebody.
And he was smiling.
Odysseus Laertides. Smiling.
His smile was so soft and smooth and tender that Penelope felt her face flush completely upon seeing him. She wanted to be the one to make him smile, she wanted to be the one to see him like this, looking so free and without tension, so relaxed.
She hadn’t ever seen him like this. When has anybody seen Odysseus Laertides smile?
It must have been a teacher. She had heard Odysseus was incredibly smart in all his lessons, and when somebody didn’t have any friends, she supposed that talking to teachers must have been the second way to obtain some form of mutual bond.
But then, she saw the person she was talking to, back faced towards the small slip in the window and she recognised him immediately.
Diomedes.
He was the captain of the track team. He had been on the soccer team before, but after he accidentally injured another player, he kicked himself out of the team and went back to track. He didn’t like a sport where he could particularly hurt anyone, or so he told Helen when she had asked him about the whole ordeal as it went down.
Penelope used to talk to him. They were nothing like close friends but they did talk. He used to hang out with her friends a lot before the accident happened, before he started getting closer to the track people and ultimately moved onto them. But he didn’t leave on bad terms. He still came and sat at their table sometimes, but he mostly hung out around the track team kids.
And he was talking to Odysseus.
Then Penelope remembered that once, so long ago, they were good friends.
They might have even been best friends, though Penelope was not too sure. She had thought that Diomedes would have completely moved on from their friendship since he was still hanging out with them when Odysseus turned his back on all of their friends, though his own accident followed behind them soon after. Penelope had thought that Diomedes had left his friendship with Odysseus like all the other guys had, but seeing the way they seemed so calm around each other, they might have never broken up their friendship at all.
She had always assumed that Diomedes had talked badly about Odysseus behind his back, but whenever she thinks about insults thrown towards Odysseus’ head, she doesn’t remember Diomedes ever being a part of it. No, no he wasn’t, or at least she didn’t think he was. She didn’t know. But she didn’t think she was.
No, he can’t have been. Diomedes, despite how rough he could be sometimes, was incredibly kind. He wouldn’t talk behind the backs of anyone, even Odysseus, whom all the other guys had turned on just as quickly as shoes hitting the ground.
Gods above.
Perhaps this was her way in.
Penelope turned back, walking through the people within the crowd, and she went to stand by the lockers near the girls bathroom, back turned, pretending to be looking at something on her phone. She had a clear view of the door from where she stood, though she was far away, and she didn’t look like she was doing anything suspicious.
And then she began to wait.
People began to fizzle out of the hallways quicker than she would’ve suspected, though there were a lot of people who stood around, looking at their phones like Penelope was, or talking to their friends as they picked books and pencils from their lockers.
She didn’t know how long she must have waited for him. She flicked her eyes down to her phone as she scrolled through the long contents of her apps, eyes always flickering up to examine the door and watch to see if somebody had walked out of the door.
And then, she saw a head of dark hair walk out of the room. By himself.
Penelope had expected this. Not even Diomedes seemed to want to be known as one of Odysseus' friends. She felt a pang in her heart for him and so, quickly, she lifted herself from where she leant near the lockers and charged towards Diomedes.
He didn’t see her coming. He was already walking down the stairs when Penelope called his name, to which he turned his head and watched her come down to greet him with his dark, shining eyes as a grin started to emerge on his face.
“Hey, Penny!” Diomedes extended his hand and Penelope clapped it, squeezing it softly. She smiled up at him and Diomedes lifted his arm around her shoulders and hugged her side. Penelope felt a grin escape her cheeks as she pressed herself against Diomedes’ side in their short hug, her heart fluttering in her chest, her insides rolling with surprise and delight. They were occupying the stairs but he didn’t seem to mind all that much, and so he let their hug linger for a few seconds too long until he looked back down at her.
Diomedes was incredibly nice. He would come into practice and spark up the team until they were all laughing and grinning and ready to play a new game, full of energy and motivation and commitment to the cause. If only he had stayed.
“How are you, pen? I haven’t seen you in forever,” Diomedes grinned, and they began their walk down the stairs after having stood on the stairs for a few minutes, laughing and grinning. He spoke softly and sweetly, grinning at Penelope with all his teeth.
“Oh, you know,” Penelope waved her hands and gripped onto the strap of her bag. “I’ve not really been busy but classes are starting to get tougher.”
“You've been studying?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s my penny!” Diomedes grinned and extended his hand. Penelope took it and slapped his palm with her own, feeling a spark flicker within her chest. It was so easy to be next to Diomedes because it felt like he radiated light, pushing shadows away from the darkness.
“We don’t even have to worry about you, dude, we know you’re gonna be alright. Always studying, always wanting to know things–”
“Stop it, I’m not like that anymore.”
“No?”
“That was a long time ago.”
“What, you ashamed to be smart now?” Diomedes smiled at her, gripping onto the strap of his own bag. “Honestly, pen, I think you care too much about what other people think of you.”
Penelope rolled her eyes, “Thanks for the life advice, Dio.”
“Nah, I’m serious! Whatever then, if you don’t wanna go into it,” Diomedes grinned at her and there was no shame behind his eyes. Penelope would have felt horrible if she had this conversation with anyone but Diomedes, but since it was him, she felt a little safer.
She sighed, feeling a weight begin to form in her chest, “How’s track?”
“It’s going good! Coach is gonna have us run ten laps around the school on Friday.”
“Ten laps? Around the whole school?”
Diomedes laughed, “I know, right?”
“Dude, good luck.”
“Nah, it’s okay, we’ve done it before. It’s not too bad.”
“Oh yes, I forgot, your tall and big and strong and-”
Diomedes cut her off with his laughter which made Penelope start grinning at him too. He extended a hand and flattened it on her head, “You should see Sthenelus. By the gods.”
Penelope raised a brow, “How’s he doing?”
Diomedes smiled at her, dropping his hand. He looked a lot tenser, all of a sudden, though he still held his wide grin and his creased eyes, “Oh, yeah, Sthenelus’ is good. The whole team's doing good. They're excited for the first race. Aeneas is a little sick though.”
“Oh yeah, I think Andromache told me about that,” Penelope remembered, looking up at him. “Is he doing okay?”
“Yeah! He is. I went by his house to check on him yesterday and he was doing good,” Diomedes smiled. “Bastards’ got a shit immune system and I was afraid he was taking it harder than he should be. But nah, he’s all good. I saw him laying around in bed when I got there and I sat around with him for a bit. We ordered pizza and chilled, played video games.”
“Dude, are you sure you’re not sick?”
Diomedes chuckled, “Yes, I’m sure. I’ve got a good immune system.”
“You sure? I remember in middle school when you-”
Diomedes shushed her quickly and Penelope began to laugh again, gripping onto the straps of her bag tightly as the delight left her heart and fell from her lips.
“Dude that was once-”
“And you never got sick again.”
“And I never got sick again.”
“Then you-”
“Then I did nothing and now we are here.”
Penelope chuckled, sounding more strange than anything else.
Now, she thought, now was her chance. Now she could ask.
“Hey, Dio,” She started, choosing her words carefully. She didn’t have much time. Soon, they would be downstairs in the cafeteria and they would both go their separate ways. She just needed to say something that would make him stop and talk to her about it. She needed to say everything in a convincing way, to prove she wasn’t trying to make fun of him, to prove that she truly wanted to know him more than anything else.
“What’s up?” Diomedes asked, smiling down at her.
Now was her time to ask.
She couldn’t wait a moment longer.
“I saw you talking to Odysseus in the chemistry lab.”
Breathe.
“And I just wanted to know- Are you still friends with him?”
Well, she couldn’t sound more judgy than that, could she?
But Diomedes didn’t look alarmed. He didn’t look frightened, like he had been caught in a trap of some sort. He only smiled at her, his grin now hidden behind his lips, and he nodded, “Yeah, we talk sometimes. We weren’t as close as we used to be but we’re still tight.”
Penelope felt her heart pound in her chest. Her cheeks flushed completely and she wanted to kick her feet and giggle like a child who had gotten something she desperately wanted.
Diomedes didn’t sound like he was guarding anything, didn’t sound like he wanted to keep anything away from Penelope’s waiting ears. He sounded sure of himself. He sounded kind, caring as he always was. Penelope must have been slightly wrong about their friendship.
“Oh really?” She asked, playing dumb.
Diomedes shrugged, “Yeah. But you know, that’s how people are. They grow apart, I guess.”
“Yeah.”
She couldn’t let this conversation die out.
What she needed was to be honest. She could be honest with Diomedes, in only a certain amount, in order to get the information she needed.
“I tried talking to him before,” Penelope admitted, laughing slightly after the words came out of her mouth. “But he didn’t seem so interested in talking to me.”
“Oh, nah, I don’t think that,” Diomedes shook his head. “He’s just… I don’t know, like, he hasn’t talked to anyone for a while so he’s a little out of it, I guess. But he’s a really good guy. Really funny. Really fucking smart too, you guys would be really good friends.”
You guys would be really good friends.
Despite that last word, which didn’t really matter to Penelope at all, she felt like she was soaring through the sky. They would be good friends, according to Diomedes, who knew both of them, so in some sort of way they were compatible.
“Really?” Penelope laughed. “I wanna talk to him a bit more but I don’t know what to talk to him about. He seems really closed off.”
“Yeah, he kinda is. Not a lot of people wanna talk to him because of the whole…” Diomedes trailed off and waved his hand. “It’s stupid, anyway. But yeah, he’s really chill. He likes those really old horror novels, you know what I’m talking about? Like dracula and shit. He really likes movies too, dude, he takes a film class and shit.”
“That’s cool,” Penelope smiled, soaking up all the knowledge she could get.
“He really likes theatre too- Oh, dude, you know what he told me? He was like, talking about these tickets he got. He’s going to see the phantom of the opera in a couple of weeks and he was gonna go with his sister but she doesn’t wanna go now. He asked me to come but I can’t, I’ve got a track meet then and by the time I’m done, I’ll be all sore and sweaty. Plus, the theatre’s a bit far away. I don’t know,” Diomedes shrugged.
He’s got tickets to the phantom of the opera.
They walked down the last staircase and made it onto the ground floor, the cafeteria door open right beside them. Diomedes smiled at her, stepping inside, “So yeah, there’s that.”
Two tickets.
Penelope smiled, “That’s cute.”
Two tickets to the phantom of the opera.
Diomedes looked at her and raised an eyebrow, smiling as if he understood something strange, “I’m gonna go find Sthenelus. I think he and the other guys are waiting for me outside but I don’t know. I’ll catch you later, ‘kay pen?”
“Okay. I'll see you around, Dio.”
“See you around!”
They clapped hands again and Diomedes turned to leave. Penelope was left there, standing at the entrance of the cafeteria, smiling to herself like a madman.
Two tickets to go see the phantom of the opera.
An idea was slowly beginning to form in her mind as she walked ahead to find her friends, a smile finding itself on her cheeks.