Oh, look. My heart's still beating. What a shame. The voices whispered through my head as I lay, staring blankly up at the white ceiling of my room as if it were the cover of a coffin. I sighed, closing my eyes to savour those last few moments before I woke up fully. Tuesday. One step closer to Saturday.
I opened my eyes and sat up, wrapping the blue-purple striped blankets around my bony body. "Don't wanna get up...," I grumbled to the nothingness of the room. No one in the house was awake yet, as was the life of most high school students.
I glanced out the window, covered in fuzzy-looking frost. The sky had taken on dark blue hues, and Venus - the second brightest thing in the night sky - was still visible. My eyes lazily trailed to the TARDIS shaped clock on my dresser. 5:28 AM. Two minutes before my alarm was set to go off.
I flopped back down with a groan, tossing my pale arm over my eyes. Two minutes wasn't enough time to fall back asleep, but what kind of seventeen year old girl would I be if I wanted to get up at such ungodly hours?
Didn't matter. My phone started buzzing and blasting edgy lyrics all too soon.
"There you go.
"You're always so right.
"It's all a big show.
"It's all about you."
Shut up! by Simple Plan was my alarm song of the week. I always changed it to keep things fresh.
5:30 AM. Far too early to be awake. The only thing worth doing was to sing along with the words and jump around until I no longer felt like crawling into my sheets and living there for all of eternity.
"Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! Don't wanna hear it!" I jumped off my bed and looked through my drawers for something to wear. "Get out! Get out! Get out! Get outta my way!" I sang in tune as I plucked black skinny jeans out of the drawer. "Step up! Step up! Step up! You'll never stop me!" Out next was a light blue tank top with white lettering that read "lol ur not brendon urie" over the top of it. "Nothing you say today," And then a black hoodie with a basketball printed on the back and my name on the left arm in the same color as my shirt. "Is gonna bring me down!" I slipped the skinny jeans, tank top, and hoodie onto my body.
A gentle knock on my door pulled me out of my morning scream routine. "Phoenix?" Karen Nulligan's soft voice asked. "Sweetie, could you keep it down?"
"Sorry," I grumbled, turning off the music. Though I mouthed towards the closed door, Don't call me sweetie. I listened to the silent pause between us before she gave a quiet sigh and walked back down the hall to her room.
Karen, one half of my newest foster parents, was nice enough. She was short, wirey; liked Charles Mingus maybe too much. Her hollow face, marked with ever-deepening smile lines, kinda reminded me of a bird, though her blue eyes weren't nearly beady enough to earn that title.
Her husband, Steve, now he earned that title. He probably pecked trees with his sharp nose when no one was looking. He was fat, and the bald spot in the center of his black hair could probably said morse code messages into space with its reflectiveness. The only thing separating his look from the instant thought that he took too many opioids in his free time was the kindness in his watery, pink smile.
With a glance in the mirror, I realized I sorta looked like I took too many opioids in my free time. Pale skin, hollowed cheeks, baggy clothes, and a messy black and blue bun hanging to the right side of my head.
Sighing to myself, I set to brushing and straightening my colorfully dyed hair. Once I was satisfied with its spikiness, I carefully placed silver rings in the hole in my lip and nose. I swiped on some mascara. The darkness of it only made the silver in my eyes all the more noticable. Who had silver eyes? Me, apparently.
I snatched my earbuds off the messy, cluttered desk and plugged them in, promptly resuming my wake up playlist as I wandered out of my bedroom. Na Na Na by My Chemical Romance (God rest its soul) blasted in my ears.
6:13 AM
I had eighteen minutes to kill until the bus from Hell came to my stop. Grabbing a piece of refrigerated pizza, I sat at the four person table, looking out of the window onto the snowy lawn. The sun shone down on the pure white snow, momentarily blinding me. I fucking hated snow. However, I had to admit, the natural light and post-hardcore music brightened my mood a little.
Then, of course, it had to go and die.
The quiet, however cherished, also brought forth memories that were better hidden. Better avoided. Things that I didn't want to remember. My brain just barfed it all back up into my mind.
I had a great family. I was actually a good kid. I had two loving parents and a role model big sister, Mackenzie. Shit was hard sometimes, but usually life was great. Mom was a principal at Gernald Middle School, and Dad owned a mechanic shop. He smelled like oil and musk, and Mom smelled like lavender, and Mackenzie smelled like smoke because she burned everything down.
Literally.
I was twelve when it happened. Mackenzie threw some party when Mom and Dad went out for their usual date night. It got bigger than Kenzie had expected. It was loud, and messy, and I was scared of all the people, so I stayed up at the top of the stairs and watched strangers turn our living room into carnage.
I hardly recognized anyone. Mackenzie danced and drank with people I don't think even she knew. Occasionally, a string of smoke would rise above the crowd as someone puffed a cigarette or a blunt or something of the sort.
It was sometime after midnight when my parents barged in, Mom already screaming. I scrambled up the stairs as Dad yelled for everyone to "get the fuck out of our house." Even through the closed door, I clearly heard Mom telling Mackenzie that she was grounded "until I say otherwise."
I faked sleep when they opened my door.
"At least one of our children is good," my mother whispered.
Dad came to my bed and kissed my head. "We love you, Phoenix. And your sister, too."
That was the last thing I ever heard my parents say. Mackenzie must have missed something while she was cleaning up the mess downstairs, maybe a candle or a cigarette. I woke up to the scent of smoke and the screaming of fire alarms and then all my memory turned fuzzy.
That's where my memory blurs. I woke up coughing in a hospital. I must have fainted or something, because the nurses said the firefighters found me unconscious in my living room. They said it was a miracle that I'd survived.
And then they told me.
I didn't think it was much of a miracle to be the only surviving member of our family.
Dad didn't have contact with his family anymore, and Mom was a foster kid. I never thought I'd follow in her footsteps. She promised I never would, yet there I was. Sitting at a foster home's table.
We held a double funeral for my parents. They thought maybe Mackenzie had set the fire and ran away, because they never uncovered her body. Five years later, and there's still no trace of her. My sister could be dead, and I wouldn't even know.
6:26 AM
Quiet feet padded down the wood floor of the hallway, pulling me out of Memory Lane. Standing in the doorway was a short blonde girl with Karen's wide, blue eyes. "That's not a real breakfast," the thirteen year old said to me.
"I didn't ask you, Faith," I grumbled, standing up.
"Mom's gonna be upset if she finds out you were eating pizza for breakfast," she continued.
I rolled my eyes and picked up my pin-covered backpack, heavy due to the three AP textbooks it held. "Then make sure Karen doesn't find out." I didn't say anything else as I stomped out the front door, not looking back.
Faith Marie Nulligan was Karen and Steve's most prized possession. Their little angel could do no wrong. It wasn't like they blamed all her faults on me - I wasn't some step sister in a princess story. They just ignored the constant calls from the school about how Faith had stolen a girl's gym clothes or pushed a guy in the lunch line at Gernald Middle School.
They refused to believe Faith could ever do anything like that.
I shivered, waiting on the bus. It arrived a minute late.
6:32 AM.
I hauled my bag onto my shoulder, and strode onto the evil automobile.
"Hiya, sweetheart," the bus driver said to me with a smile. Frank was a creep. Always flirting with all the girls. He had to be at least forty.
"Put a sock in it, Frank," I grumbled, shoving my way to the back of the bus, where I always sat.
"Loser!" Someone Faith probably knew called as I sat down. I pulled out my book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by the famous J.K. Rowling. Someone threw a crumpled up piece of paper at me, making me barely flinch.
I just sighed, trying to read.
Just a normal day in Hell.