Free Phoenix Rising by Cynthia D. Grant Page A

you coming over here, or writing me, or calling. I just want you to leave me alone! Is that clear?”
    I slammed down the phone, cutting off his voice. I’ll never know what he was going to say. I’ll never know if he got scared because we were getting “too intense” or because he found out that I’m dying .
    I am dying. There is no escape .
    Here comes my visual therapist, galloping up on her spangled stallion. She says, “Dying only takes a hot second, Helen. We’re living till the last breath.”
    That’s easy for her to say; her bones don’t ache. She has all her strength and her hair. She has the future to open like a birthday present. She isn’t trapped in a body that’s betraying her .
    No matter what she says, she can’t save me .
    I wish I could talk to Jess, but she gets scared when I’m depressed. And the folks keep up this big cheerful front; like, if they run fast enough, the truth won’t catch up. So I feel like a cloud at their garden party .
    I know how hard this must be for them. Their baby is sick and all they can do is stand by helplessly. Whereas I’m on the inside, looking out, and I know how I feel, and how much I can stand, and frankly, my dear, I can’t stand it .
    Sara Rose just came over. She wanted me to come out and play, but I asked Mom to send her away. I told Mom I was nauseated (true) and hid my eyes, so she wouldn’t see Bloomfield inside them .
    I am so sick of being tired. I am so tired of being sick. I’m dying from the feet up. My toes are always frozen. I’m sick of being examined and stabbed and jabbed. They expect me to be such a “good sport,” as if I’d been born to be a pincushion, as if my mission in life was dying .
    My therapist charges by, hollering, “Rise above the pain!” I’m trying but it drags me down, grabbing my ankles, grounding me. “You’re a bird, Helen! Fly!” And I rise off the pain plain, like a plane lifting up off a flaming runway, into a blazing blue sky .
    O lift me up! My God, please take me. My heart is breaking. I want to die. I am so cold and no one will hold me. O Bloomfield, why won’t you love me ?
    Please love me please love me please love me .
    I am too much trouble. Revolting. Repulsive. A piece of diseased meat. I could smash my bedroom mirror and use the glass to slash my wrists, but Mom would just have to clean up the mess, which wouldn’t be red, it would be green as money and stink like chemotherapy. Hold your nose and drink the poison, Helen; it might kill the cancer or it might kill you. Look on the bright side — what have you got to lose ?
    I feel so sorry for myself. This is a true extravaganza. I am wallowing in a tub of warm self-pity .
    Damn it to hell, I have a right to be angry! Damn it to hell, I’m going to die! And I’ll still be a virgin! And I won’t ever have a baby! And nobody’s ever going to love me most of all !
    My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? I believe in you and you don’t believe in me! I’m the only person in this family who isn’t an atheist or a Unitarian — and you’re going to kill me !
    Why is this happening? If there’s some reason or plan, could You give me a hint? It would mean a lot !
    I want to die for something, like rescuing people, or fighting for freedom. I want there to be a reason for my life, and my death. Is that so much to ask ?
    Nobody’s answering .
    The only person I can really talk to is Ms. Tormey. She’s known about the cancer for months. (Now everybody at school knows. Secrets leak out of Bambi. It’s amazing she kept her mouth shut so long.)
    Ms. Tormey listens; she doesn’t flinch or change the subject. She tells me to write down my feelings on paper. She says, “Use it, Helen! Use the fear and the rage!” Writers can’t change the world, she says, but they can make poetry and laughter