A/N: Sorry for updating this one late. I am just into my other story that I didn't think about this story. Thank you to Emoen, UroborosTyrant, and Queenoftheworldintraining for the reviews. I also need to apologize for it being short, but I found it best to end at that point. I mixed some humor with some seriousness in this chapter. And of course, I found some sort of way to put in the games you guys thought of. Hope you like this chapter and enjoy! ^-^. Edit: Thanks to Emoen for telling me my mistake. I only noticed one, so I'm not sure if I missed anything else. I've been updating my stories all day today. Six (not eight but six, I unconsciously wrote down eight when I was looking at the chapter number. -.-'') stories in one day, whoop! Some of them are short around 800 words though. -.-
Chapter Eight
It was just a game. Nathan's mind kept on telling him so, but he glared at Phoenix with contempt. Phoenix just smiled smugly as she watched him make weird movements with his body. Shilo stared at her father with such concentration while having a quizzical look on her face. A few seconds later, her eyes widened and she stood up.
"A penguin!" Shilo shouted. Nathan's eyes brightened and he nodded before he let out a sigh of relief and sat next to Phoenix. It was finally Shilo's turn to go up.
"Lighten up, Wallace. It's just charades," Phoenix told him. Nathan glared at her again, and she just chuckled.
"I feel silly," Nathan muttered unhappily.
Phoenix shrugged and said, "Well, it was either playing with dress up or charades. I'm sure playing with old Barbie dolls is out of the question. You also don't seem to deem yourself as a dress up kind of guy." Nathan continued to glare at her but more fiercely this time. "If it makes you feel any better, you can laugh all you want when it is my turn."
"I will," Nathan said, "Oh yes, I will."
Phoenix rolled her eyes.
"C'mon guys. It's my turn," Shilo told them when she noticed her father and Phoenix weren't paying her any attention when it was her turn. She crossed her arms to show her discontent. Phoenix smiled and gave Shilo all of her attention.
"Sorry, Precious. You can start now," Nathan said and now looked at her acting out what was on the card.
After several attempts, Nathan had finally gotten what Shilo was acting out. She was supposedly a butterfly. He should have known it had something to do with insects when his daughter glowed in such happiness. And after a while, Shilo had won the game. Second place had to go to Nathan since he knew Shilo well and Phoenix was as good as she could be. Phoenix didn't mind losing, but she was aggravated with Nathan when he was having fun torturing her to pieces by making random guesses just to spite her for making him play the game. And of course, he kept his word in laughing at her when it was her turn to act. She was just as bad as he was.
"I want to play something else," Shilo said, seemingly more excited after the game of charades.
Nathan groaned. He didn't mind games, but anything to do with physical activities and girly things were out of the question, even though he had no choice in the matter when they played charades. Shilo asking him in her own little cute way was not something Nathan could decline. He sometimes wonder what sort of power Shilo had on him to obey her like this.
Phoenix smirked and relaxed on the couch of the living room and yawned a bit.
"You can look through my bag and see if there are any games you would like to play," Phoenix told Shilo. Nathan whipped his head to look at her. He was obviously shocked and uncomfortable. He then turned to glare at her bag and wondered what kind of evils lurked inside. If glares could burn holes, the bag would have surely been destroyed.
Meanwhile, Shilo was excited and ran to her bag. She started rummaging through Phoenix's clothes and other things she packed inside. Phoenix was rather surprised at how excited Shilo can be. She figured that Nathan and Shilo needed to spend more time together. After all, she was going to stay over for the night. She wanted to at least have a comfortable atmosphere.
"Ah ha!" Shilo shouted after she pulled something out. She held an old raggedy old box with some of the colors and pictures fading from it, but the game's title was still clear though faded it may be.
"Operation?" Phoenix asked. Shilo nodded and pointed at her father.
"Dad's a surgeon. Right dad?" Shilo said with an utmost smug smile on her face, showing how proud she is of her father.
"Ah, a surgeon, is he?" Phoenix asked, a smirk playing across her lips as she looked over at him. Her arms folded, and she gave out a mischievous aura that only Nathan found to be intimidating.
"Yup," Shilo confirmed.
Nathan froze. It wasn't truly a lie that he was a surgeon. Was, meaning he used to be. But then again, he was still a surgeon in some way. He still cuts open people's bodies. The only difference is that he was taking the organs out not putting them in.
"My grandmother gave this to me, but I'm not sure if you guys would like to play it. It is a rather old game," Phoenix said. Shilo smiled that energetic smile.
"I want to play it," Shilo said, giving the box to Phoenix.
"If you say so," Phoenix said before taking the box without any objection. On the other hand, Nathan felt uncomfortable. He wondered if he would look evil as he played the game. After all, his monster side always come out at the most inopportune times.
They started playing the game, but Phoenix realized she was good at the game. She couldn't help but smile at how frustrated Nathan looked at losing. For goodness sake's, he's a surgeon! How could he lose to such a game? Shilo couldn't help but giggle when she found her father to be a sore loser. He always talked about how surgery had such precision. In this game, he was not precise.
After the game was done, Phoenix and Shilo had such confident smiles while Nathan seemed oddly pissed off. He was supposed to win the game if anything, but how could he lose to Operation? He glared at Phoenix and thought the game was rigged.
"Hey, don't look at me like that. I didn't do anything except play the game. It's your fault you were..." Phoenix tried to continue, but she couldn't contain her laughter any longer. Shilo couldn't help but laugh with her. Poor Nathan blushed in embarrassment. This game was terrible indeed.
"Can't believe you lost to your daughter and even that woman is better than you. You're a legal assassin. What happened to your fucking precision?" His repo side yelled at him in his mind.
"Shut it," Nathan yelled back in his mind. "It's not my fault that game hates me."
"If I played," Repo growled.
"You did! You were the one taking over my hands, you insufferable monster," Nathan yelled.
When Nathan made a point, his Repo side no longer disturbed him. It was one argument Nathan won, but he didn't feel too good about it when he lost to a game of Operation. Terrible. Terrible indeed.
"Ah, cheer up, Wallace. At least, we are finished playing a game for today," Phoenix said. That did nothing to help his mood. It actually made it worse.
"I want a do over," Nathan suddenly said while he crossed his arms. He wasn't going to play the game and win this time.
Shilo and Phoenix were surprised at his sudden competitive side. When the two females looked at each other and then back at Nathan, they smiled and said, "Sure!" in unison.
In the end, he lost once again though he did a little better than last time. All right, he did worse. So what? He wasn't going to admit that he is terrible at it. It's just a game after all, even though he didn't treat it as just a game. It was then Phoenix realized he was down right scary when it came to fun games.
The sun had started going down, and Shilo went to retire in her room for the day right before she drank her medicine. Phoenix was relieved to find herself relaxing on the couch after an exciting day. Nathan was sitting upon the opposite couch staring at her. After he calmed down from getting angry about losing, he finally wanted to ask a question to Phoenix when he found her in a good mood.
"Phoenix?" Nathan started, feeling quite nervous as he finally got the chance to talk to her about something serious.
"What is it, Wallace?" Phoenix gave her full attention towards Nathan. She noted how serious he looked and found herself ready to calmly answer.
"At the grave, I saw a knife next to you when you were unconscious. I... does it belong to you?" Nathan asked, his eyes staring at her intensely. He felt incredibly difficult to ask, but he needed to know. He had to keep his friend safe. Phoenix sighed and nodded.
"Yeah, it belongs to me. Why do you ask?" Phoenix questioned back, not at all lying or holding back the truth. It wasn't like she needed to hide anything.
"What were you-? Were you thinking about-? You know do the same thing as your brother after he died," Nathan could only say. It was hard to ask her if she was going to commit suicide, and he couldn't say those words all the more. He knew she didn't know he listened in on her conversation to herself. It was hard to hide that fact now.
Phoenix's eyes widened at him before she let out a sigh and leaned back on her couch.
"The question you were going to ask. Were you going to ask if I was going to commit suicide on my brother's grave?" Phoenix asked. Nathan hesitantly nodded his head. Phoenix just smiled before she suddenly let out a sad laugh and shook her head.
"Don't make such conclusions, Wallace. I'm not that weak. To answer your question, no. I'm not the kind of person to commit suicide even when hard times come. If I did, I would have killed myself a long time ago. And anyways, my brother wanted me to keep on living. He wrote it on the note the day he died. If he had asked me to do something, I would do it. Even with the note, I would have not killed myself either way," Phoenix answered. She found herself fidgeting with the hem of her shirt. It was difficult to think about her brother, and it was even harder to talk about it.
"Then what about the knife?" He asked, slightly startled at the answer. He was relieved, but he was confused about what happened that night. Did he come to the wrong conclusion?
Phoenix shook her head at the thought of the Repo Man as he asked that question.
"I only wanted to mark my brother's name on his grave. Do you think I would allow my brother to go unnamed like all the other unmarked graves? If it wasn't for that bastard of a Repo Man interfering, I would have already carved out my brother's name by then. It was the last thing I could do for my brother, and he deserve his name on his grave," Phoenix answered with indignation.
Nathan was surprised. All she wanted to do was carve her brother's name on his make-shift grave. Nathan felt stupid, yet he would never regret it. He would rather take the chance than not knowing what would happen. He let out a sigh of relief before he made his way towards her and sat next to her. He took her hand with his and looked at Phoenix in the eyes.
"I'm glad you are alive, Phoenix. I don't think I would handle it if anything were to happen to you," he told her truthfully. Phoenix was shocked for a second before she started laughing. Nathan wondered what was so funny when he was being rather serious.
"You make it sound like I'm your lover, Wallace. Don't talk like that," she pointed out. She suddenly took Wallace's hands on hers and put it on top of her chest. Nathan suddenly blushed as his hand was close to the middle of her breasts. Phoenix rolled her eyes before slapping the back of his head. "Don't think anything perverted."
Nathan winced at the blow and nodded, not saying another word. Women were truly scary even his wife scared him when she was tempermental.
"With this hand of yours on my heart, I, Phoenix, will promise not to do anything that results in me taking my own life," she said as if making a contract. She laid her hand back on his lap and smiled. "Better?"
Nathan was a bit speechless, but he couldn't help but smile and nod.
"Very," he told her.
