Killing Butterflies

I have an odd relationship with death. When I lose a family member, or if a friend passes away, I do not automatically feel sadness, like most. Perhaps that has something to do with my beliefs. I believe when someone dies, there is always talk of a light at the end of the tunnel. What if that light is the hospital room where that person is being reborn into their new body, all their old memories wiped.

Honestly I can’t take the credit for such an idea, I believe I first discovered that theory in a meme. I can’t retain the smile that tugs at my lips as I knead the bread on my granite counter top. I plop the dough in a bowl, covering the opening with a linen dish towel.

Death does not make me sad, it makes me hopeful. It ends the suffering in this life and hopefully gives someone another shot at a better life. My hands begin to shake as I grab for a knife and slice off chunks of cheddar from a hunk of cheese.

Of course, I’m not so naive to not see that the new life someone is reborn into could be worse. I suppose that is where karma comes in. If a person has done enough good, or at least tried their best, then they shall be rewarded with a new and better life, right?

My uncle withered away because of his MS, but he was a good man, so my hope is he was reborn into a life where his body wouldn't betray him.

I placed the cheddar chunks in the basket with some grapes and a slice of apple pie wrapped in silk. I turned to my front door, slipping on a mustard colored sweater, and switching my house shoes for rain boots.

I followed the stepping stones to my garden. The overcast sky and thin fog caused my vision to seem hazy as I gazed at the daisies swaying gently in the breeze. I bent over to scoop up some berries from a nearby bush. I glanced lazily toward the lake that sat at the end of the hill on my property.

Perhaps my grandpa was reborn as a strapping young man who is missing most of his teeth. I meandered back into my house adding the berries to the basket. I wondered why my grandma held on for so long after my grandpa had passed. I don’t believe they were in love. Maybe she was relieved. From my understanding my grandparents had a more methodical relationship. Make babies, maybe attempt to start a farm, fail, and become alcoholics instead.

I rearranged the basket several times before finally finishing the bread.

…

The sherbet shy told me it was time to deliver the basket. I could already see the faded full moon through the hazy air. I took my time descending the hill, remembering my cousin who died in a terrible drunk driving accident. It’s unclear who was driving, but they were all drunk. Four of them got into that car crash, four of them died. According to the police report my cousin held on for as long as she could, slowly bleeding out from her missing limbs. They seemed to be able to deduce that was how she died from the drag marks leading from the passenger seat to her corpse a few feet away.

I really loved my cousin. She reminded me a lot of myself, or who I used to be.

I stared into the black water for a long time before setting down my offering at the end of the dock. I pulled my gray cardigan around me tighter as I look longing up at the moon one last time. I climbed the hill slowly, counting my breaths.

As I laid in bed, listening to the normal nature sounds of crickets chirping, and branches rustling, I felt my eyes grow heavy as I thought of another uncle, who died of alcohol poisoning. Perhaps my mother’s family is cursed. Perhaps I’m cursed.

…

I heard her in the dark of the night. I don’t know why I assumed it’s a woman. She splashed out of the lake, riffled through my basket, there was silence while she ate. I sensed her dragging her sodden limbs up the hill, toward my house. She never comes in though, which I believe is thanks to my offering every full moon. Sometimes she’ll press her face against the glass of the window to my bedroom. I can see her silhouette through my thin curtains. She stands there for several hours before returning to the lake.

I always know it’s her because in the morning I’ll find the dried carcasses of several butterflies. Their orange wings shriveled like dead leaves off a dying tree. As I collect the dead butterflies, placing them carefully inside an empty tea box, I remembered my grandma’s funeral. The night before I had to rewrite the eulogy since my mother had drank too much and couldn't write straight. As I was reading what my mother wrote, the unfinished thoughts and vague memories, I offered to make a few edits. My mother seemed to love it that night, but after the reading at the funeral, she turned to me, comically saying a little too loud: And you’re a writer?

I winced as I dug a little hole for the butterflies, hoping to bury the memory along with the poor, defenseless creatures. I popped my head up toward the house, hearing my phone vibrate from the patio. I jogged over to the device, answering it right before losing the call.

“Hello?” I said out of breath.

“Moon,” I heard my sister say in a quiet voice.

“Yes?” I replied, feeling my belly drop to my feet.

“It’s mom.”

…

I sat in my car for the funeral. I didn’t mean to. I missed the whole thing, just sat there, gripping my steering wheel, staring at the Tesla logo. It was my sister’s husband who found me, informing me we were headed to the cemetery. I nodded without saying anything. I watched as the procession left, while I just kept sitting there. I was consumed by the toxic memories my mother left behind. Should you be eating that? I thought we were cutting sugar out of your diet? How are your journalism classes going? I wish you would have…

I remembered how she favored my sister when she and her husband announced they were trying for a baby. How I slowly detached myself from the family. How with every miscarriage I couldn’t be there until after the fact. How slowly my sister stopped talking to me.

I squeezed my steering wheel so tightly, little white skulls appeared where my knuckles should have been.

“Fuck this,” I muttered, finally starting my car and driving away. I couldn’t comfort my sister, couldn’t face my father. So, I kept driving until I crossed over into another state. I purchased a coffee mug from a gas station with Illinois on it.

I checked into a hotel, sleeping like the dead.

…

I spent weeks on the road, buying my clothes when I needed more, checking into hotels, and living off pastries and coffee. It was week three of living like this when I fell into a restless sleep. I was surrounded by butterflies that turned to angry moths. I tried to scream as they swarmed me, but they filled my mouth, choking my airway. I was finally able to open my eyes, but I couldn’t move. I scanned the room wildly, feeling my heart against my chest as I spotted a figure in the corner of the room. Her long, stringy hair hung in her face. She wore a tattered night gown and her limbs were bruised, or rotten. Her hands were clenched into tight fists. I tried to turn on the lamp, but I couldn’t sit up, couldn’t even wiggle my fingers. I pried my eyes from the figure in the corner to the window. There was a crack in the curtain where I could see a moonlit stained sky. The full moon. I looked back to the corner, but she wasn’t there anymore. She stood at the foot of my bed, where I could see she was missing half her face.

Perhaps when people die, they don’t always get reborn. Sometimes they get stuck. I wanted to scream I was sorry, but I couldn't move my mouth, so instead I squeezed my eyes shut. I counted backwards from one hundred. I felt the weight shift on the bed, I squeezed my eyes tighter.

I felt her as she laid her body against mine, her breath was cold on my face. I pressed my eyes shut so hard they began to hurt, then I felt nothing.

…

I glanced at the rear view mirror at the shoe box I had filled with the butterfly bodies. I was almost back to my house, hoping it wasn’t too late to make an offering. I parked the car, squinting at the house. The front door was open. I exited the car guarded, popping the trunk. I grabbed a crow bar, slowly making my way to the front door. Pushing it open gently, I dropped my weapon. The house was trashed. The kitchen looked like it had exploded, every single piece of glassware shattered. My living room furniture was turned over, my plants thrown against the walls, where dirt stained the yellow paint.

I hurried down the hall, finding my bedroom untouched. The only thing out of place was the bed, the comforter was rumpled in the shape of a slender body. What have I done? Making an offering to an unknown entity for years. What was I thinking? I touched the covers where the woman from the lake must have laid.

I ran back down stairs, stomping my way down to the lake, where the basket I had left her last month still sat. It was filled with what looked like dried blood and shredded fish. I kicked the basket into the lake and let a scream escape my body that was so vile, I tasted rust in my mouth when I was done.

What have I done? I thought once more as I stared into the still water. She will find me, no matter where I am. She is connected to me, through my belief in her. I have literally been feeding her for years. Not with the food, with my anger. My depression. All this negative energy I have been carrying for most of my life. I sat down on the dock, feeling the blood that spilled from the basket soak into my jeans.

I thought about my friend who passed from cancer. His death was the first in a long time I did feel a pang of sadness for the absence of his presence. Like I would never see him again, and I wasn't totally sure he lived a good enough life to be reborn into a better one. He was a decent enough person, but I didn't know him as well as I wished I did.

I waited for the sun to set, darkness spilling over me. The water was still, the air silent. Then I saw her. She poked her head from the water, just her eyes and forehead visible. I didn’t move, just looked at her, meeting her lifeless gaze. Her head started to float toward me until she was at the end of the dock. She looked… familiar.

I stood abruptly. I turned to the house, walking calmly up the hill. I heard the splash of water, my heart hammering in my ears.

“Please,” I whispered. “Go away.”

“Never.”