The Golden Child and The Unwanted Ghost
The fire was a hungry beast, and it was eating my world alive.
Smoke, thick and acrid, clawed at my throat, a predator strangling me from the inside out.
My lungs screamed for air they couldn't find.
Heat pressed in from all sides, a physical weight, melting my skin, boiling my tears before they could fall.
Through the roaring symphony of destruction, I heard my mother's weak cough from the other side of the room, followed by a choked whisper.
"Morgan… run…"
But there was nowhere to run.
The door was a wall of flame.
The windows had shattered, feeding the inferno with greedy gulps of oxygen.
I saw him then, a silhouette standing in the doorway, framed by the very fire he had set.
My brother.
Maxwell.
His face was illuminated by the destructive glow, his expression one of pure, ecstatic triumph.
He believed he was purging the unworthy, the obstacles to his golden inheritance.
He believed he was a god, passing judgment.
And in my final, suffocating moments, a single, agonizing thought consumed me.
It was all my fault.
I had supported my mother’s defiance.
I had encouraged her to stand up to them, to fight for what was right.
I thought it was courage.
It was a death sentence.
If only I had another chance.
If only I could go back to that day, in that hospital room, when it all began.
I wouldn't be brave.
I would be smart.
I would burn their world down before they ever had the chance to light a match in mine.
The darkness took me, cradled in a final, silent promise.
§01
"She's being selfish, David! Utterly selfish!"
The voice, sharp and imperious, sliced through the fog in my mind.
Beatrice Lowell.
My grandmother.
"Your father is on his deathbed. All he wants is to see his grandson. Is that too much to ask? A simple C-section?"
I forced my eyes open.
The sterile white of a hospital room.
The faint, antiseptic smell.
The rhythmic beeping of a machine I couldn't see.
And there, standing over a woman in a hospital bed, was the entire Lowell clan.
My grandmother Beatrice, her face a mask of pinched indignation.
My father, David, looking helpless and stressed, wringing his hands.
A host of aunts and uncles, their faces a chorus of disapproval.
And in the center of it all, my mother.
Katherine.
Her hands rested protectively on her swollen, eight-month-pregnant belly.
Her face was pale, her expression a mixture of exhaustion and defiance.
I was in a small chair in the corner of the room, a forgotten accessory to the main drama.
My own small hands clutched a worn teddy bear.
I was a child.
Again.
The memory of fire and smoke surged, so real I could almost taste the ash.
It wasn't a dream.
It was a memory.
I was back.
This was the day.
The day it all began.
§02
"It's not simple, Beatrice," my mother's voice was quiet but firm.
"The doctors said the baby isn't ready."
"It's only thirty-four weeks."
"A C-section now is risky for him."
"Risky?" my grandfather's voice boomed from the hospital bed in the far corner.
Walter Lowell.
The patriarch.
Even weakened by cancer, his voice was a whip crack.
"What's risky is denying a dying man his final wish!"
"That boy is a Lowell!"
"He owes his existence to this family!"
"He can show up a few weeks early to pay his respects!"
"Dad's right," my father chimed in, his voice pleading.
"Honey, they say the technology is amazing now."
"Babies born even earlier are fine."
"And… it would mean the world to him."
"To all of us."
He was a husband and a father, yet his first loyalty was not to his wife or his unborn child, but to the tyrannical will of his own father.
"Exactly," Beatrice nodded, her eyes narrowing at my mother.
"When you had Morgan, I was too busy to help."
"But this is different."
"This is a grandson."
"I've been waiting for him."
"But your father-in-law can't wait."
My name.
Morgan.
They spoke it like an afterthought, a footnote.
In my first life, I saw my mother’s pain and ran to her side.
My support gave her the strength to refuse.
A refusal that festered into a grudge, a grudge that ended in fire.
This time, I would not be brave.
I would be a serpent.
As Beatrice's sharp eyes suddenly landed on me.
"Morgan, you're the big sister. Tell me, don't you want to see your little brother sooner?"
I met my mother's worried, searching gaze.
I let the teddy bear fall from my hands, stood up, and walked toward them.
I didn't go to my mother.
I walked straight to my grandparents.
I looked up at their aged, calculating faces, and I gave them the most innocent, angelic smile a child could muster.
"Mommy," I said, my voice sweet and clear, turning to face her.
"Grandpa and Grandma would never hurt us."
"They wouldn't hurt the baby."
"I really want to play with my brother."
"Please?"
"Let's listen to them."
§03
The room fell silent.
The shift was instantaneous.
My father's face flooded with relief.
My grandmother's stern expression softened into triumphant satisfaction.
Even Walter, from his sickbed, managed a grunt of approval.
Only my mother looked at me with a pained confusion.
"Morgan, sweetie, you're too young to understand…" she began.
But my words had been the crack in the dam.
The pressure of the Lowell clan poured through.
"See?" Beatrice crowed.
"Even the child understands loyalty!"
Walter seized the moment, pointing a trembling finger at my mother.
"You hear that?"
"You obstinate woman!"
"Are you going to deny your own daughter now, too?"
"Grandma, Grandpa," I interrupted, placing my small hand on Beatrice's arm.
"Mommy just needs a minute."
"She loves us."
"I'll help you talk to her."
"I'm her favorite, you know."
The transformation in my grandparents was startling.
Anger melted away, replaced by beaming approval.
Walter fumbled for a wallet on his bedside table.
He pulled out a credit card and had my father pass it to me.
"Morgan is growing up," Walter declared.
"A sensible girl."
"That's your reward, child."
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