233 more

She stopped believing in God three months after she married Jaden Nicholls. It was simple, letting go of her faith. How could she hold onto someone she’d never seen? Something that couldn’t save her sister from her addictions? How could she trust a person so cruel?

So it was easy to let go of the early mass and the liturgy of the word and the liturgy of the body and communion and the holy days of obligation. It was easy to sleep late and not worry about what someone at church would say. And nothing seemed better. They had Ailis when Phoenix turned two and it was beautiful, hearing the sound of two laughing children in the house that seemed so empty. They looked so much alike, they could almost pass for brother and sister. They knew they weren’t, but it was fun, some days, to pretend.

Occasionally, she would remember God. She would wake up late at night in a panic and pray to whoever was listening to watch over her children, to let her have another child. But those times were few and far between. Her prayers were never answered.

It was no wonder the children grew up irreligious and… different. Ailis became a blonde haired cross between a tomboy and a girly-girl. Her slight frame went anywhere, and no one could get past her infectious smile. Phoenix, too, was beautiful.

141 more

…

A phoenix is just a bird. A dumb, everlasting bird. Myth says its beauty is unsurpassed by anything, save Lucifer himself as Michael the Archangel threw him from heaven. But, if all you have is beauty, it doesn’t make for much of a life, does it?

A phoenix lives for five hundred years, seeing much. Much life, much death, much fear and anger. At the end of the five hundred years, when it senses its death is near, it travels to Phoenicia to build a nest of wood. The sun god hears its song and pauses in his flight across the heavens, lighting the funeral pyre. Roast fowl. From its ashes, it is reborn, without the memories of its previous life.

Legend claims there’s only one phoenix. That’s because that much stupidity cannot be repeated. Nor that much beauty.

…

426 more

She watched the two of them grow up, never correcting anything that seemed just outside the norm. Her own parents had been disciplinarians, militarily strict. Every moment of the day had to be accounted for. Every action had to have logic behind it. And don’t let something go wrong. Just the thought of subjecting her children to such a nightmare of a house dominated by fear and Bible-thumping made Denise become the exact opposite of her own upbringing. And it seemed they blossomed under the seeming neglect. They found their own paths.

They were… free. Free of oppression. Free spirits. Free to become what they needed to be.

Ailis was wild, headstrong, active. Curious. Anything that piqued her interest was worth trying. Even things that could be more dangerous for her like snowboarding and surfing. She broke all the longstanding co-ed barriers in the neighborhood, joining the Little League baseball, football and soccer teams. She played catch, and dress-up, and dolls; the perfect mix of a child.

Phoenix wasn’t normal, either, though it may have been more harmful to the boy to be left to his own devices the way Denise left him. He was a magnificent baby, the pale fringe of his eyelashes framing large blue eyes that took in everything. He rarely cried, and never caused any trouble. Perhaps that’s why she found out so late about his condition.

She first noticed it when Ailis was born. Phoenix was two years old, all smiles and ‘No!’ and hair as pale as moonlight. Playing with the baby shouldn’t have taxed him so. His hands began to tremble and his breath came erratically. Denise glanced at the boy, not realizing what was truly going on. But, suddenly, he was lying on the floor, limbs twitching painfully and his lungs stopped short.

Her own heart pounding in her throat, Denise threw herself to the floor beside Phoenix’s body, barely registering her daughter’s plaintive cries for her playmate. Her fingers searched for and found a faint, rapid pulse, too fast to be normal.

“Oh, Nicky…” she whispered, trying to keep him alive as Jaden called for an EMS.

The hospital was a blur of lights and voices; questions asked and answered by a voice like her own. Like a twin, Denise thought hysterically, screaming ‘Save my baby! Save my baby!’ But her twin wasn’t watching her baby die. The thought was too much for her to handle, and Jaden had to drag her gently from the observation room above the ER to a waiting room three hallways away.

274 more

…

The phoenix senses that its death is near, after it has seen the world. The sun god has seen it bathing by the well everyday for the past five hundred years. When the phoenix knows it is time to die, it travels home and begins to sing the most beautiful dirge not yet known to man.

Lose the self you thought you knew
Blind and pained from break and bruise
Can you give up on what you know?
One more chain. Death is slow.

Feel the sting of blood… your own
Dark eyes, your head meets with stone
Breathe, the friends who love and care
Will save… Fall, die, you don’t have a prayer.

The sin you have is more than you pay
You should stop the pain, but it keeps dreams at bay.
Turned black and blue, you try to end
The life you do not seek to mend.

To grow old is a sin and a crime.
Who needs to stand the test of time?
Save who you are by never being close
To any and all you love the most.

The light grows faint. My time is here.
Tell Mother not to watch my funeral bier.

The sun god is enthralled by the song of the phoenix, and can’t help but stop in his tracks. The moment he spends doing so, marveling at the bird with the fiery feathers, ignites the nest of wood and spices it has made, starting the funeral pyre. Thus ends the poor bird, roasting him alive.

But it takes more than a slight imperfection to cause the phoenix to just give up on life.

…

452 more. last for today

Anouar Khomsa Malkese rubbed his eyes tiredly. He’d tried to find any other explanation for it. Yet, there wasn’t one he could find for someone so young.

“Mrs. Nicholls? I’m not quite sure how to put this….” No, that’s not the way to say it. Do I break it to her easily? Or do I come straight out and say it?? he thought miserably.

“Dr. Malkese?” a timid voice said from the door of his office.

“Yes, Naomi?”

“The Nicholls are here to see you.”

He sighed low and wearily. “Send them in.” There is no time like the present.

As a family, the Nicholls were perfect. Mother, father, daughter and son… pale and fair. How could he ruin their lives with this… this pain?

Jaden looked at the doctor levelly, gray eyes assessing him as well as if he had watched him progress through medical school and on through all his years of residency. “Well?”

Anouar felt impelled to tell the truth to this man, who, with so much as a glance and a word, placed his faith in a complete stranger. “It’s called sustained ventricular tachycardia. It’s a serious arrhythmia, where the heart rate can reach over 100 beats per minute until stopped by something.”

“Something?” asked Jaden. One word, again, as if saying anything more would be a betrayal of something deeper than the care of a boy who had become his son.

“Either drug treatment, or electrical conversion. Defibrillation.” He sighed and sat forward in his chair, linking his fingers together on his desk. He stared at them as he began to speak again, avoiding looking at the family in front of him. “This is very dangerous for Phoenix. It can degenerate further into ventricular fibrillation. His heartbeat will be totally disorganized, to the point where it won’t be able to pump blood anymore. It won’t contract. And if it…” he paused. “If it isn’t stopped within two or three minutes, he won’t survive.”

Denise gave a mournful sob, choking tears back. “My Nicky… my poor Nicky.”

Jaden closed his eyes and breathed deeply, regaining his composure. “What can we do, Dr. Malkese?”

“Keep him calm. His heart will be able to sustain him longer if he stays away from cigarettes and alcohol, caffeine, drugs…. He should try to avoid any kind of anxiety, if he can.” Anouar finally looked to the four of them. “Phoenix can’t prevent his problem. If he can control the way he handles nerve impulses and slow his heart rate, then perhaps he’ll be able to deal with this. I can prescribe some medicine….”

“Yes, yes….” Denise rubbed her red-rimmed eyes and stared at Anouar, eyes glistening with more than unshed tears.