<b><span style="font-size: 18px">The Weaver and the Maid</span></b><br/><div style="text-align: center"><b><span style="font-size: 15px">
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<span style="font-size: 15px"><a class="username" data-user-id="8147" data-username="Finnrin" data-xf-init="member-tooltip" href="https://blackdahliaroleplaying.com/members/8147/">Finnrin</a></span>​</div><br/>The goddess wanted to laugh, but it would have been a slap in Cora's face, considering the young woman's insecurities.  Still, she smiled at the girl in the woman's body.  "My beautiful girl," Athena said to Cora, "if we wanted to be together, only time could split us apart.  Time that would make me seem static and too slow to change, like a glacier.  You could not drive me away, but you could become tired of me, angry at me, resentful of me.  If you did those things, then I would drive you away from me."<br/><br/>Cora seemed confused, as if she couldn't imagine being with Athena for that much time and that she didn't know that Athena would hardly seem to age at all while she continued to mature, age and live to look like a crone if she did indeed, live a long life.  Athena favored Cora with another soft and loving smile.  She grabbed a linen napkin from a nearby table and used it to dry Cora's tears and wipe her nose.  When she was done with the napkin, she dropped it back on the table and sent a silent message to Gany, requesting someone to bus the table.<br/><br/>Taking both of Cora's hands in her own Athena led her back to the loom and the tapestry.  "Let me tell you more of what I've learned about the comedian in the tapestry," the goddess began.  "As a babe, he had been given away by his birth mother because his natural parents were irresponsible.  When he was still a child, his adoptive parents, instead of allowing him to think that he was their own flesh and told him he was not the son of their bodies.  He seldom thought that he 'fit' in anywhere.  One of his favorite things to do, when he was feeling down, was to listen to the recorded stories and musings of the famous comedians.  Their voices colored his mind with pictures, showed how absurd life could be and the laughter from the audiences was like music to him.  That became his refuge, his armor and his dream.  As the years passed, he was battered into believing that it was more important to exist than to dare at fulfilling his dreams.  Still, he had adventures, sailed the seas, walked on all of the continents.  He married late, after securing a normal livelihood and a number of refusals to his proposals.  They lived together for ten years.  The last three years of his wife's life were torturous, first falling and being somewhat crippled and then dying two months after learning she had cancer.  After that, he decided that instead of feeling sorry for himself and dying inside that he was going to do what he wanted to do before it was too late.  He then devoted all the time he had left to writing and performing and managed limited success, because fame is fickle and fleeting.  Then he came in here, because this place is legendary to great performing artists and most artists don't believe it really exists.  He was not scheduled, but some strings were pulled and he was allowed onto the stage."<br/><br/>Athena looked at her work and was amazed.  Not that it was great art, but that it commemorated great art, life and love.  Then she looked at Cora.  "So, Cora, are you simply going to exist in a belief that you don't deserve to be loved and that you will always drive your lovers away, until you are old and your bones ache and then you decide that you need to try harder to change your fate..."  The goddess reached forward to touch the girl's chin and leaned in again to give Cora another soft kiss, "or are you going to seize the day, each and every day, with some days more successful than others, rebuilding yourself with a good night's sleep after every tough day?"