September Surprise Story Week: Callidora continued: Deities World collection: 509 words
See the beginning of this story here ( LJ link).
See the second part of this story here ( LJ link).
“There are days,” Callie said, staring at Archimedes' desk, “that I think I'll never be ready to truly take my place as a deity.” She sighed. “I'm not worried so much about the knowledge that I'll need because I know that I'm getting there slowly, but I don't think I have the temprement to do what you do or what Mum does.”
“Look at me, Callie.” After a few moments she did look up at Archimedes and saw the sympathy in his eyes. “We're all different and it's really not right for you to compare yourself to me, Mum, or anyone else.” He smiled at Callie. “You will make a wonderful deity, but to be that deity you don't have to be like someone else. Just be yourself.”
“Is that really going to be enough, Archimedes?”
Archimedes looked at her. “What do you see when you look in the mirror?” he asked, finally.
“You know that's a question I've never been able to answer,” Callie replied quietly.
“It's a question you need to be able to answer, Callie. If you don't know who you are then how can you hope to connect with anyone, let alone a race of people.” He reached over and squeezed her hand gently. “I know it's hard to be able to see yourself truly but you need to take the time to do it.”
Callie nodded. “That's what Hecate's been saying.”
“You and I both know that Hecate is always right.” Archimedes laughed. “Having her for an adopted grandmother is both a blessing and a curse, but I'm glad that she's one of your mentors. She is the right person to teach you to see yourself as you are.”
Sighing, Callie looked at Archimedes' desk. “I'm scared that I'm going to let her down.”
“You're not going to, any more than you're going to let Mum down, or Dad, or Nan, or me, anyone else you can think of. This feeling of not being good enough will fade in time but I think it's one of those things that we all go through at some point. I went through it when I worked out exactly how important Dad has been through the millenia and for a long time I was terrified that I would never live up to his, imagined, expectations of me. It wasn't until I actually talked to him about my worries that I realised the only way I could possibly disappoint him is by not being myself.”
“I think mine's being caused by the work Mum's doing at the moment. She seems so able to cope with anything and I can't see myself ever being the same way.”
“You do realise that the only reason Mum seems able to cope with everything is because she works very hard at not showing the word how difficult it is to be in her position. It's hard to get past the mask she uses, but I think if you were to ask if she wanted help with anything she would jump at the chance.”
© K A Jones 2011
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.