Immortal Souls: Phoenix Always

Thirty-Nine Lives

I suppose most people would be tired of living after nine centuries. But it's not living I don't want to do anymore. It's dying. I'm tired of dying.

I drag my exhausted body to the bathroom across the hall from my bedroom and reluctantly greet the mirror. Terrified blue eyes reflect back at me. Bloodshot, swollen eyes afraid of the future. Of five days from now—Wednesday, November second. The date repeated in my head all night last night. It flashed like an unset digital clock behind my eyelids until I gave up trying to sleep.

On this day nineteen years ago, I turned forty-seven years old. Five days later, my heart stopped beating for the thirty-eighth time. That's how I always die. My perfectly healthy heart just stops. I never feel a thing. Physically, at least. But agony rages deep within the part of me that lives inside the bodies.

What makes this birthday different from all the rest? I accepted my potential death last year and the year before...and the life before. I have for every birthday in every life for the last eight centuries, and I did what had to be done.

Speaking of what has to be done, I drop Visine into my eyes and do my best to conceal the sleepless marks without caking on makeup. Beautiful freckles speckle the porcelain skin on this face, which I refuse to cover. I love this body—it's the best one I've had since my days as a Chinese contortionist—and I may not be so lucky in my next life. I hate to think I'm so shallow as to be afraid to die because my next body might not be pretty. But my list of things to worry about in this life is short, so I can't be picky.

In my emerald accented but simple bedroom, I slip into faded jeans and a black David Bowie T-shirt, forever grateful for the evolution of fashion and women's rights. But there are some changes I refuse to get on board with, like music. I miss eagerly awaiting a new Beatles song. I don't know what the crap on the radio is these days.

Boots on, I inhale a preparation breath to face a different kind of music. My parents—another pair of unfortunate souls who got stuck with me—beam at me from the kitchen as I make my way down the hall.

"Happy birthday, Phoenix!" my mom squeals as she lights the "18" candle stuffed into a mound of whipped cream atop a stack of waffles, strawberries, and chocolate sauce.

I've had thirty-nine sets of parents name me Phoenix in one language or another. I hate that damn name, but I would never let them know that.

I return their smiles with my own and turn up the fake enthusiasm I mastered ages ago. "Finally! I'm eighteen!" I widen my eyes and do some stupid dance for emphasis. It makes parents happy. But I've had twenty-five "eighteenth" birthdays. Being an adult is overrated.

I continue the stupid dance right up to the kitchen island where my parents stand on the other side laughing at me. I pull back my beloved red, wavy locks and blow out the now sinking-into-the-whipped-cream candle. I don't like cake. I've never liked cake. Unlike my last set of parents, David and Samantha Maison actually care about what I like and don't like. So strawberries and waffles it is.

"Oh, nice touch with the sprinkles, Mom." I pluck one of the rainbow sugar skulls out of the whipped cream and pop it in my mouth.

"Thank you. I wish I could take the credit, but I bought them." She slides a glass of milk to me as I climb onto a stool.

David sticks a fork in the giant stack of yummy and hands one to me and another to his wife, his hazel eyes alight with joy. I look forward to this tradition every year, and just like the previous thirteen waffle-eating birthdays, I wonder if this will be our last year to devour a diabetes-inducing amount of sugar together. I like these parents. No... I love them, and that's why I didn't sleep.