Tuesday, October 29, 2024

God of my Choosing: Chapter 1 – Paradise

Chapter 1 – Paradise

As Tyler rises from his sleep and our bed, the sun rises on the earth. He is the god of light and the light of my life, after all. His white face and eyes outlined by black lines and constant smile shine brighter than the sun on me and give me more energy to rise than the feeling of another great day.

“Good morning, my love,” he says before kissing me on the head.

Tyler changes from his nightwear into his usual white dress shirt with golden lines on it, black body suit, white shoes, and black pants in a flash of light.

“Good morning,” I say back and then change into my usual clothes as well, a long, dark golden strapless dress, and light golden shoes.

My hair has changed from its disheveled look and curls into something presentable like that of a crown with two horn-like ends to it. I look into the mirror, look at my bright blue eyes, and then apply light gold makeup to my cheeks, eyes, and lips, and then make sure my gold and black choker with a dark golden sun on it appears around my neck.

“All ready, Giselle?” Tyler asks.

“With you, I’m ready for anything,” I say and then kiss him on the lips.

Tyler teleports us to the streets of our wonderous city streets that are already busy with other gods like us who are going about their daily business. They tell us good morning and say hi to us and we do the same while holding each other’s hands. We go to my family’s restaurant and are seated almost immediately. My parents, brothers, and sisters join us for breakfast and enjoy each other’s company while making small talk about business and how things are going.  After we’re done eating, Tyler and I go our separate ways for now to do our duties for the restaurant.

I play the piano and sing to add to the restaurant’s atmosphere while Tyler uses his light to brighten up the place to make it shine more than it usually does while also providing nutrients to the plants outside and my parent’s gardens. It’s a humble and repetitive lifestyle, but it’s one that I appreciate and enjoy living every day of my life. While playing, Tyler stops by to give me kisses, check up on me, and later have lunch together. For my final performance of the day, he acts as my dancing and singing partner as we sing one of our many favorite songs to end the day. The crowd cheers and claps for us as Tyler and I kiss.

After the crowds leave, my family, Tyler, and I eat supper together. My parents remind me how proud of me they are and my siblings tell me how cool I was. Tyler and I say goodbye after eating and teleport back to our room in an instant and switch into our nightwear just as quickly before falling into bed because of all the work done today. We rest in each other’s arms, kiss each other, and say goodnight as Tyler turns out the last lights of the world, and the god of night takes over for now. The god of dreams weaves for me a reality in my head that I wish were real as I dream about dancing with Tyler forever while singing song after song all the while being praised and adored by all who watch us. A familiar and disgusting face in the crowd catches my attention, and as soon as it does, I wake up in a cold sweat.

Looking around, I make sure Tyler is with me and I’m still in Paradise. Thankful that I am, I lay back down, cuddle up closer to Tyler, and fall back to sleep. I see a different face that I recognize who reaches out to me before I wake up again to see that Tyler has made the sun shine on a new day. We go about our daily routine like yesterday except we don’t stay to work at my family’s restaurant. Instead, today is our day off so we roam the city of gods, taking in its sights, sounds, and pleasantries. The first place we go to is the art gallery, or as some call it, the Artist’s Heaven.

It's called the Artist’s Heaven because all gods of art, like myself, gather here to share their craft, are rewarded for their work, and give feedback on them. The gallery is separated into three sections: writers, painters, and musicians with subsections in each gallery for every particular kind. For example, there’s a horror section in the writer's area, sculpting in the painter’s section, and separate piano and guitar sections in the musician’s area. Since I’m interested in everything, I look at pretty much everything, get Tyler involved with the art activities with me such as drawing and singing, and talking to other gods of particular forms of art. By the end of it, I see that it’s almost afternoon.

“I’m so sorry for taking up so much of the day with activities that you weren’t as interested in,” I say.

“No, it’s fine. It’s worth it just to see you happy,” Tyler says. He raises his hands and pushes the position of the sun back a bit. “Besides, I am the god of light after all. I can put a bit more time into the day.”

For the rest of the day, we do activities that Tyler is interested in such as getting involved with sports and watching the horse races. At the end of it, we eat dinner at a restaurant inside one of the stadiums, but we both notice something is wrong when the night seems to be darker than usual.

“Do you think something is wrong with the god of the night?” I ask.

“No, no, this is something else,” Tyler says.

Fireballs start raining down on the city as the dark gods attack us. Tyler and I race out into the streets to lend our support to the city’s defenders. I play and sing songs that give strength to the guards while Tyler uses his light to blind our enemies and fire to burn them. One of the dark gods, who I saw in my dreams, comes after me and tries cutting my head off with her knives. Her name is Xara, a dark god of thieves and a lifelong enemy of mine. She has a black halo around her head, strains of red hair coming from her bald head, red and black eyes with tears of blood coming from them, a black dress, and a black necklace with a red teardrop-shaped stone. I use my music to confuse and cause her pain in her head as she wildly swings her weapons at me.

“I’ll defeat you this time, Giselle!” Xara says.

“And I won’t let you escape alive!” I say back.

“You’ll kill me? Ha! As if you could do anything but uselessly play your music. You can’t defeat me, especially when I can do this!”

A bright light comes from Xara’s necklace that gets the attention of Tyler and seems to temporarily put him in a trance. I use my music to counter Xara’s dark magic and give Tyler to break free from her influence. Tyler then uses his fire magic to blast her away into the sky. Seeing that the other dark gods are retreating, Xara curses at me and then retreats with the rest of the scum.

“We can’t let her escape this time! We have to finish her off!” I say.

“No, it’s fine. She can never do any lasting damage to us and will never separate us,” Tyler says as he grabs my hands.

The look in Tyler’s eyes convinces me of his words and I reluctantly agree with him. He’s right. The gods of repair and healing instantly repair the damage done to the city and bring back to full health those who were hurt during the battle. Since so much happened during the day, we go home to rest. I’m still uneasy about letting Xara go and worried about what she might do when she comes back. Even so, I manage to fall asleep because of my exhaustion. While sleeping, I see a familiar face in my dreams, but this time, it isn’t Xara. It's the other person. Someone whose face I should better recognize and who I feel I should love more than I do.

He points to me, and says, “Wake up, Giselle.”

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