This is a short fiction piece I wrote; the prompt was just to write a piece that had something to do with a butterfly. Enjoy!
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Go Figure
It’s
amazing what can happen because of a butterfly. Doesn’t Chaos Theory say
something like that? I don’t know, doesn’t matter, the point is, it all started
with a butterfly. Go figure.
The only
exercise I really get these days comes from walking. I can’t afford a gym, and
I’m not sure I’d go to one if I could—all those people looking at you, ugh. I
just can’t face that. But walking can get boring unless you mix it up, and if
I’m bored, I plain won’t do it. On that particular day, I started feeling bored
about halfway through, and to top things off, my iPod died. So I was facing
thirty minutes with nothing to distract me from the fact I was exercising, and
my brain wasn’t really up for that.
I was
trying to come up with some game I could play to keep my mind busy, when a
monarch butterfly flew across my path. They aren’t rare or anything, you can
see ‘em all the time if you know where to look. It just seemed like perfect
timing is all, so when it flew around the corner I figured hey why not—I’ll
follow it.
She flitted
around the way butterflies do—backtracking, going in circles, then jumping far
forward—so I had to really focus to keep up with her, and I probably looked
like a crazy person changing direction all the time. But you know, random
movements are supposed to fool your muscles, or something like that. At least
that’s what they’re saying today.
So I was
watching her hard, and after a while when she decided to set herself down for a
minute, I looked around while I walked in place. Wouldn’t you know it, I was on
a street I’ve never seen before, no idea how we got there. I’m not one of those
people that make, what are they called, mental maps? I used to get lost in the
building where I worked, no lie. So it probably wasn’t too smart of me to
follow a butterfly, truth be told.
The street
wasn’t anything special, but just around the corner I caught a glimpse of that
pretty woodwork you seen on Victorian houses, what’s it called, corbels?
Spandrils? I don’t know. But there it was, in these whimsical colors, navy blue
and mint green, with bits of coral here and there. I couldn’t help myself, I
have such a weakness for that sort of thing, so I went around the corner to see
the rest of it.
It was so
charming, covered with all sorts of gables and little porches and it even had a
circular stained glass window. It wasn’t huge or anything, and it wasn’t
restored perfectly, but it was the kind of house that just makes you happy to
look at, you know? So I pulled out my phone to take a picture of it. As I was
trying to figure out how to make it look the other way (why do I want a picture
of myself anyway, I know what I look like!), I heard someone call my name.
I looked
up, and there was a woman at the door. She looked vaguely familiar, but I
couldn’t place her.
“Maggie,
it’s Deanna. Don’t you recognize me?”
Well, I’ll
tell you, you coulda knocked me over with a feather. Deanna and I had been best
friends way back up until the fourth grade, years and years ago. We did
everything together, shared all our secrets. She was always there for me when
my mother would have one of her ‘episodes’, and I showed up at her house
crying. She’d hug me and let me cry it out, never asked questions I didn’t want
to answer. And then she’d find some way to take my mind off of it all. It near
broke my heart when she moved away; in those days we didn’t have Facebook or
Twitter or My-gram or whatever those all are. We didn’t even have e-mail. I
felt like I’d lost a piece of myself, and although we wrote letters, both of us
moved around so much after that, we eventually lost touch.
I ran up to
her, and we gave each other the biggest hug, tears streaming down both our
faces. I guess I don’t mind telling you, I’ve been lonely since my daughter
died. Not a lot of people stick with you through something like that; cancer is
a horrible way to go, and it took all my energy trying to help her beat it. I
just didn’t have time to keep up with my friendships, I guess.
We talked
for two hours, catching up on everything in our lives. She had three girls, and
one of them has passed too, can you imagine? Talk about knowing what someone is
going through. We talked and we cried and we laughed, and I swear, it was like
we never left each other’s side.
I had to
leave because of my doctor’s appointment, but she’s coming to visit tomorrow.
Isn’t it amazing how these things happen? I don’t know how it works, or why,
but I’ll tell you this. When I left, that butterfly was perched right up on her
fencepost.
Go figure.
© Michelle M. Chouinard 2014 All rights reserved.
