It’s not one of his. The pages aren’t all the same size, or even the same color. Who knows where they may have been plucked from? A few have been dog-eared, and must now be creased beyond repair. And now that he’s holding it, he can’t say that the cover feels all that familiar either. Stiff material. Good for a book well-loved. Or, one that would be well-loved. Or, one that might have to endure a bit of abuse, and come through alright. 

Impossible to miss a signature like that, really.

His arms wrap around the precious book, all the way around, hugging her hand to his chest too. It takes a careful wriggle, but he pulls one arm free, and with it, the cookbook. He sets it on the counter, safe from any accidental bumps or spills, and returns to the careful work of holding her. The mighty hand of Alexa turns over, flipped by irresistible nudges, that he might raise it high and gently bonk his forehead against it.

“I wish it could be that simple. But we may not even remember that we’ve forgotten anything at all.” He sighs. “Suppose we lost our ability to write, too. We’d learn again, and our handwriting would change, and our written voice would change, and we’d never recognize a note to ourselves, not in a hundred years. Or suppose we lose all language entirely. We learn from those on the other side of the Rift, but their words have grown differently than ours, and we never are able to figure out what our own letters mean to us again.”

His fingers idly stroke hers, and he needs all of them to do the task properly. Tracing patterns through the worn metal, working out little bits of grit and shooing them away. Sit still, Alexa. He’s working on you. You wouldn’t interrupt a helpful sheep in the middle of his task, would you? Of course not. Sit. Stay. It’s alright.

“It’s in all the stories, right?” A smile, holding up an entire sky of despair. “It never ends well when someone tries to get more clever than the gods. We’d either need a god to take our case themselves, or-”

His brows furrow. His fingers halt, just for a moment.

“...or Aphrodite would have to willingly allow enough of us through to. To. Still be ourselves, afterwards.”

It was his Rift, after all. His work. That no other god could undo or interfere with. Didn’t it stand to reason, then, that he would decide what might stay, and what would be lost in the crossing?