Magwazine

Guardian angels come in all shapes and sizes.  Little Kevin’s was bigger and greener than most. And had one giant eye and horns.

He was a seven-foot monster. And his name was Magwazine.

Magwazine spoke in a tongue only one other person could understand. He communicated with a series of grunts and guttural sounds.  It was a language invented by little Kevin himself.  Thanks to a series of ear infections, Kevin’s speech had been delayed. (And then after time, abandoned all together.) For nearly over two years, he heard the world like a person three-feet underwater.  Fluid had congealed in his inner ear causing developmental problems with his speech. Kevin’s world became a world of his own.

And it was a world that frustrated everyone not in it.

Kevin’s parents sought out every expert they could find. Tests revealed the need for more tests.  And those tests led to even more tests.  The final diagnosis was as confusing as Kevin’s speech.  The doctor’s were confounded — “He has a massive reception language (words that he understood) but just can’t speak.”  By the time he was two years old, he had created his own little world.  And in that world, he met Magwazine.

Magwazine and Kevin played in their world every single day. They ate picnics of blueberry pies under the purple sky.  Rain clouds of lemonade and taffy soaked the land with sweetness.  Roses and daisies lined the roads they ran along.  They played tag. They built sandcastles in the white, powdery sand.  Yellow birds sang beautiful songs. Sunbeams warmed them as they napped beneath the giant blue trees.  It was an ideal world full of imagination and wonder.

Kevin loved Magwazine. And Magwazine loved little Kevin.

Every night, Magwazine would read Goodnight Moon as Kevin drifted off to sleep. Magwazine would just sit there, watching and thinking how much he loved his little friend.  A moonbeam crept in the window and hugged the monster and the boy. Magwazine’s heart was as full as the moon outside.

No one in the outside world could see Magwazine.  No one in the outside world could understand Kevin.  And neither really cared.

On Sunday night, Magwazine once again read “Goodnight Moon” to Kevin as he slowly drifted off to sleep.  Magwazine kissed his little friend on the cheek and pulled his covers up to his chubby cheeks.  Another day of play had come to a close.

Magwazine watched as the moonbeam snuck into the room like a tabby cat, creeping stealthily across the room. Little Kevin was well protected.

Three o’clock in the morning brought deep sleep and smoke.  An electrical fire had started in an outlet in the guest bathroom, starting a small fire that quickly grew out of control.  Alarms screamed and Kevin’s parents leapt out of bed.  The father ran outside and saw flames shooting out of the roof — right over where Kevin’s bed was.  His mother quickly ran out behind and screamed when she saw the flames.  Smoke billowed.  Kevin’s father ran toward the door in Kevin’s room. The intense heat pushed him back.

Magwazine saw the smoke trickle in and block the moonbeam.  He knew something was wrong and quickly went into action.  He wet a shirt with a glass of water and put it over Kevin’s nose. He then pulled the him down to the floor, where the oxygen was.  Seconds turned into minutes.  The flames knocked at the door.

Sirens filled the night air as the fire department arrived.  Kevin’s father repeatedly tried to get closer to the door as the smoke began to obscure the house.  The fireman pulled him back as Kevin’s mother collapsed on the ground sobbing.  “KEVIN!!!” she cried.  And what they saw next left them as speechless as their son.

Through the smoke came a giant green monster with one eye and horns. And in his arms was a little boy wrapped securely and carefully in a blanket.  Magwazine carefully handed Kevin to his father, grunted a guttural growl and kissed his friend on the cheek.  And then he turned around and walked away.

Several fireman and two stunned parents watched in silence as guardian angel walked into the darkness.

His father put Kevin down. The little boy ran over to his mother and leapt into her arms. And then he did something that even would have surprised Magwazine:

He spoke.

“Mommy!”

“Daddy!”

Then, two words were followed by a third.  Little Kevin looked into the darkness and saw his friend.  “MAGWAZINE!!”

And that’s when a horned, one-eyed monster blew his best friend a kiss and disappeared in the darkness of the night.

The End.