As the English staff meeting ended, Paul gathered his things, ready to get home to see Sally.
As he exited the building, he held the door for a coworker, Jane.
“Thanks,” she said, balancing her numerous books and papers in her full arms. “How’s Percy’s project going?” she asked, as they made their way in the same direction, the teacher’s parking lot.
Paul furrowed an eyebrow. “Hm?”
“Our annual freshman year family tree project,” she specified.
Oh lord, he thought to himself. Firstly, there was the fact Percy was a major procrastinator. This project happened every year, all freshmen did it no matter if they took Honors or Regents English. Secondly, there was Percy’s family tree…
“Well, he’s having trouble,” Paul began. “Percy’s father’s side has it’s… issues.” There really was not an easy way to tell your step-son’s teacher that his family tree was not only the first family to ever exist, as well as very incestous.
Jane nodded. “Oh, we get those every year. We try to be sensitive with kids who don’t have the perfect family dynamic. I would’ve felt so awkward if we had this at my high school, I had two half siblings from two different men!” she laughed, and Paul did too at the absurdity of the comparison.
“Yeah, something like that,” Paul agreed.
“Well, his class is after lunch, if he’d like to discuss before presenting. Or we can email.”
“Thanks, Jane,” Paul said kindly, getting into his Prius.
He came home to the dining room table scattered with thick books. The Entire History of Greek Mythology, one read. Percy was hunched over, gluing a tiny piece of paper with a name to the very top of a long piece of paper. Chaos, it said.
“Jesus, Perce,” Paul said to his step-son. He momentarily wondered what Percy thought of him saying Jesus. Learning recently about the Greek gods being real meant Paul would need to adjust his use of expletives.
Percy looked up at him. His eyes looked strained, probably from reading all the huge books around him. “I hate my family,” he sighed.
Paul sat down beside him. “I think you are the only person entitled to say that.”
Percy had done a pretty good job, Paul thought. Besides the misspellings, it would probably earn him an A+ in a Classics class. It was hard to look at, with all the red lines connecting Zeus to all the relatives he’d had children with. Each layer was a different generation, and it went on for about six or seven. At a lower level, yet not the lowest, was a blue scrap of paper that said Perseus Jackson. Next to it, Percy had put siblings like Triton, Theseus, Tyson, Orion, Rhode, and a bunch of others.
“Percy, I don’t know how to put this lightly but…”
“Oh gods, did I mess something up?” Percy said, exasperated. His eyes quickly scanned the dozens of little papers for error.
“No, this looks perfect. It’s just… Well for instance, this is your family, right?”
“Unfortunately.”
“And there’s a lot of… well they keep it in the family, you know?”
“Gross, but yes.”
“And you’re presenting this to your class…”
“Oh,” Percy seemed to realize.
“Now, I don’t think anyone should ever be embarassed of their family…” Paul began to say, when Sally entered the apartment with groceries.
“Hey,” she greeted, as Paul stood to help her put them away. She came over to kiss her son on the forehead. “What’s this?” Sally asked, looking at the mess of names.
“It’s a Goode tradition for freshman to make a family tree for English their freshman year,” Paul explained.
Sally pursed her lips. “Percy, it looks wonderful, it really does, but you realize your teacher sees this, right?”
It all seemed to be clicking for Percy that honesty probably was not the best route for a project like this. “Yeah, I get it now. I’d look insane showing this,” he said blatantly.
Percy looked down defeated at his wasted work. Paul pat him on the shoulder. “Maybe I can talk to the other sophom*ore year English teachers to make a project like this for our reading of the Odyssey, so don’t throw it away,” Paul suggested.
He scanned it again, feeling rather bad that Percy had wasted probably two hours on it. Above Percy’s name was Sally Blofis, and connected to it was Paul Blofis.
“Hey, there’s me,” Paul pointed.
“Yeah,” Percy said, still looking sad. “You are family.”
It made Paul smile. “Look, let’s make a new one, especially without Zeus.”
Thunder struck outside, which made Paul fear for his life that the lord of the sky would strike him down for the insult, but Sally and Percy just laughed.
The new family tree fit on standard printer paper. At the bottom was Perseus Jackson. (Percy begrudgingly said that Mrs. Keene, Jane, had told them to put their full name, as they were also supposed to explain the significance of it).
Above was his parents, Sally and Poseidon. (Percy chose to just write their first names, so he didn’t have to explain his father lacked a last name because last names didn’t exist when he was born). Stemmed off from Sally was himself, Paul Blofis. Above Sally was her parents, Estelle and Jim Jackson, as well her father’s brother, Rich Jackson.
It was simple, and fairly normal. The criteria from the project asked that students presented some family backstory, which Percy decided to make up as he went.
Paul emailed Jane later, because he wanted her to know how much time and effort Percy really put into the project, without exposing anything.
Hello, Jane. Just wanted to write you concerning Percy’s project. He did a project at first that spanned several generations, it took him hours. But there are some issues in his father’s side, major drama, so we decided to scrap it. Just wanted to let you know. I’m very excited for his presentation tomorrow! - Paul.
The next day was the presentation. Paul stood outside the doorway to watch, he didn’t want to embarass Percy or anything.
“And that’s my great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather, a king of Scotland,” some kid finished up, head held high.
“Alright Jonathan that was wonderful!” Jane said cheerfully. “Percy, you’re up!”
Percy nodded from the back of the class and made his way to the front, giving her his piece of paper with the family tree. Jane placed it under the projector.
Percy cleared his throat and faced the class, hands in his pockets. “So, uh, this is my family. Here I am at the bottom, uh, Perseus,” his face reddened at saying his full name. “My mom named me that because she liked his story.”
“Didn’t that guy kill Medusa?” someone called out.
“Yeah,” Percy nodded. “He was the son of Zeus, in Greek myths. My mom mostly liked him because he wasn’t, like, stabbed brutally in the end or anything.”
The class laughed goodnaturedly. Percy’s anxiousness seemed to go away. “So yeah, that’s my namesake. I kind of hate it sometimes, but at least it’s not Hercules or something.”
The class laughed again. Paul found himself grinning too. “There’s my dad. His name’s Poseidon, ‘cause we’re Greek, and Greek people love god names, I guess. His family’s really big and all have weird names, plus I don’t really know most of them, so I’ll leave it at that. Then, there’s my mom. Her name’s Sally. Her dad was Jim and her mom Estelle, and she had an uncle Rich. And she’s married to my step-dad, Paul, who’s pretty great. And yeah, that’s pretty much it,” Percy finished.
Percy stood there awkwardly, waiting to be told he could sit down. Jane was marking up a rubric, and Paul could see it was a perfect grade. “Very nice, Percy! Your family has some pretty cool names. Do you like Greek mythology?”
Percy shrugged. “It’s interesting, yeah. But they have one messed up family tree.”
Jane laughed. “Yes, they really do. That would be a fun project, wouldn’t it? Maybe next year, when you all have the Classics unit.”
Percy returned to his seat. Paul caught his eye and gave him a thumbs up. His step-son grinned back.
