“You can’t hide from me,” She said. “I’m not trying to hide from You, Selene,” I replied…knowing it would irk her to hear me call her that. She did not rise to the bait. Stoic as usual. “For a female You show so little passion, Luna,” I prodded her. If You’ve never felt the equivalent of an impossibly powerful Deity…flicking You in the forehead, then I can’t explain what that statement got me…but I just laughed. Don’t get me wrong…it hurt, but I deserved it, and delighted in provoking a response so out of character for Her. “Silly to test me. You are but a simple mortal in spite of Your perceptions and gifts.” She paused and I could feel her Soul conquering gaze. “Why are You smiling like a fool?” I had no answer, so…I simply didn’t answer. If a Deity could roll her eyes…she did. I smiled even bigger. I don’t think I had been able to provoke such a response from her in years, maybe ever. Harmless fun. “If You aren’t trying to hide from me, then what would You call it, mortal?” she said. I wasn’t sure I wanted to go there, but really…I owed her an explanation. “I’m not hiding from You, I’m…ignoring You.” She did not like that. I needed to expound anyway. “Well, not YOU exactly, but IT…I’m ignoring it all.” It was deathly silent on every possible level You can imagine or can’t even imagine. Painfully silent. A silence that breaks puny mass. Like me. But I would not allow it. She did not understand what the Silence could really do anymore than she understood why I’d try to ignore the Call upon my Ancient Soul by an even more Ancient birthright. Even as I knew I could not explain it well, nor could she understand it well…I knew I should try to explain it. “No more than I can understand Your ways, Your sorrows, Your joys, Your path, dear Luna…there are things You cannot understand about being mortal.” More Silence…but less oppressive. “You’ve never walked in a body, feared death, ached in Love, despaired in loss.” I grasped for words, “Okay, so You know of passion and passion lost…You have ‘feelings’ on a level I don’t comprehend. You have need, and want….but You are given more Time to work out Your existence, to let things go, to accept the inevitable in this reality.” My explanation was crap. I couldn’t find the words. “It hurts, dear Luna. It hurts…to feel the possibility, but know I will never touch it. It hurts to have the dust of forever sprinkled upon me, but know it is not mine. It hurts to behold such beauty, but be denied it. It is unbearable to know of such perfection, but be denied its taste, its scent filling my being and making me whole. It hurts.” The Silence was less…mostly just quiet now. She was trying to understand. Odd, but I should keep trying. “You said it Yourself, Goddess. I am but a silly mortal. There is no room for silliness, or mortality, in the place You dwell. Things have... progressed without me. The cycle has continued. I’m not really needed…not really.” There it was. I’d said it…my biggest fear. I wasn’t really important, wasn’t really needed. It just made for a good story…Gods slumming it to include the very tiny, but actually needed Human. But it wasn’t true, was it? “You’re right,” she said. “Not about most of that, but about You not knowing our ways, My ways…or understanding them. You are caught in Your humanity…in a place we can’t understand. That is why You ARE needed. But I can’t convince You of that. You are too stubborn. Perhaps in time You will accept it.” I laughed wryly at her reference to Time…something I had so little of, and she had no concept of…not really. She ignored my doubt, but instead moved past it. “For now, I can tell You this and I hope You will accept it as Truth.” She paused a very long time before destroying my Soul. “Need or not, I want You. I desire You. I ask for You and wish for Your presence as much as You can. I do not want to hurt You, but I love You…and I want You here…with me.” I… I could not… I had nothing to say. I … what could I say to that? Why would she lie? I had to accept it, even though accepting it meant more than I could actually process or understand. A long time went by. As my Soul burnt and swayed in a wind of Truth that I was powerless to resist, control, or break free of…I just had to embrace it and hope to survive. I gasped out, ”Okay...okay. It hurts even more now, but if I can, when I can…as I can…I will. I’ll try to quit ignoring it, and You…and give what my mortal self can…because I love You too.” …and so She travelled across the sky, Full and bursting with the secrets She kept…and happier than I had seen Her in all our years. I did my part…as much as I could, so when Mabon came, I would be ready, and I could embrace my role…as small or large as it may be. It was mine. And I was Hers.
