A Jewelled Amber Butterfly

By Faye Bi

Butterflies are known to be a proverbial species. A silent, delicate and fragile insect with intricate designs on their wings, a butterfly’s light burden is to survive from their beastly predators. They are shy, timid creatures who attempt to blend in their backgrounds, but to the genuine eye they only stand out more beautiful than the ever-abundant dark moths who try to thrust their arrogant but horrifically common beauty upon the viewer. Such as this, there are enough butterflies in Nature, but to mirror the world of people, a caterpillar emerging from her cocoon is a difficult task.

I knew she didn’t want to be there. No matter how strict the dress code was at our school, especially the requirement to wear a uniform, she found a way to manipulate its style to suit her character. She mussed her appearance until it was both neat and unkempt at the same time, coloured the gold buttons on her ladies’ blazer with a red sharpie, dabbed little Wite-Out daisies on her $300 dress shoes, and vandalized her binders and notebooks with her personalized graffiti. I never figured out why she hated the school so much until I actually began to know her, since it ranked number one in the nation in both sports and academics. Her name was a complete misnomer - she wore not a speck of colour besides sombre blue, but for some strange reason, it suited her.

Amber.

I fell in love with her the minute I saw her.

It was mostly happening without my knowledge. I smiled at her subconsciously, as if it were a second nature to me. I flirted with her unknowingly, finding myself observing her only to jerk myself awake. She had pale skin that would have labelled her an albino if it weren't for the coal-black hair cascading past her waist. She always wore it down in front of her eyes, a ploy to distract onlookers from them. They were plain brown to the common person, but I saw a dark layer of passion and intensity framed by long lashes, thick and thin, fluttering like butterflies when she blinked. Amber did have a slight obsession with butterflies; wearing pale blue hairclips that moved so realistically, they looked alive. She resembled a china doll, though none was as strong as she - one that was distorted to the point that it was unattractive until you peered beneath the surface.

If there ever was a butterfly stuck inside a cocoon, it was Amber. She had all the makings of independence and individuality, but I always had the inkling of concealment. I decided to offer the flower of friendship to her, and she took it reluctantly. Well, that's perhaps a bit of an understatement, I suppose. Amber was suspicious of me at first, forever questioning motives for my kindnesses extended towards her and asking, "Why do this for me?"

She wouldn't understand if I told her then. So I kept my mouth shut and just smiled.

One day, my inkling was confirmed after several months, when we were paired to work together on a history project. I was sitting on the ivory carpet in her room, brandishing notes and pictures of Machiavelli and da Vinci, for a few hours. Deciding we needed a break, Amber slipped off to the kitchen to get snacks. After stretching my legs, I stood up and inspected her room.

It was normal and unadorned, save her windowsill. Painted in an icy blue, it was oddly chilly, even for a warm spring day. The windows were large, inviting sunlight into the room, with white furniture accented in maple. It was strangely colourless, like Amber, in a twisted way, but there was no navy or black - just white. Her walls were bare, bereft of posters of handsome young men or female idols in the room of a typical teenage girl. But her windowsill was a glass menagerie. Bright blue and green butterflies made of ceramic; glass and porcelain framed the window, translucent curtains holding a similar pattern. Tiny figurines of smaller butterflies, artfully placed, stood on the sill, with a gorgeous mirage of blue, turquoise and silver wings at the centre. I was admiring the central butterfly, when suddenly; I heard raised voices, which were LOUD.

"... It’s Ty's car," I heard Amber say in her soft but firm tone.

"Curse it, child! Each day I come home from work and you are doing something meaningless - you've been neglecting that flute for days, but I think this is the first time you've brought a boy into your room -"

"Ellen!" I heard Amber's voice rising. I saw her side profile from the doorway. "We are working on a history project. Do I need to spell that out for you? An h-i-s-t-o-r-y -"

The unfamiliar voice interjected, "I know how it's spelled!” but Amber went on,

"- project! That means homework. You know? The thing you are nagging me to do every day. So I can be an oh-so-hotshot lawyer to satisfy your every whim and fantasy? So you can preen me at your social gatherings like some pet and say, 'my Amber is going to study law at Harvard!' and you say I am anti-social and need friends and a nice boy and I actually bring one home for WORK purposes and you accuse me of –"

"Be quiet!" the piercing, thundering voice yelled. Although I couldn't see her through the door, I could imagine her face growing white. "You shall not speak to your mother like that!"

"YOU'RE RIGHT, I WOULD NEVER SPEAK TO MY MOTHER LIKE THAT, BUT SINCE YOU AREN'T MY MOTHER, I CAN SAY WHATEVER I WANT!" Amber screamed, and at the shock of her fury and loss of her self-control, my hand jerked, knocking the jewelled central butterfly to the floor.

I stood wallowing in guilt and anxiety at the broken butterfly, although nobody heard it since Amber was yelling at the top of her lungs and the carpet muffled most of the crash. But I was astounded, worried.

A few thundering footsteps and a slammed car door later, Amber returned to her room, the idea of refreshments forgotten. Every bit of her remained as serene when she left, except her eyes that glared with anger and exhaustion.

"What did you do to my butterfly?!" she whispered when she saw me and the ruined masterpiece by my side. I noticed that her voice was hoarse from yelling. However, that short calmness evaporated when I said nothing.

"WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY BUTTERFLY?!" Amber repeated, her fury returning, this time directed at me. "THAT WAS THE LAST MEMORY I HAD OF MY MOTHER, AND IT'S BROKEN! WHAT HAPPENED!?"

With a swift motion, she spun and pinned me against the wall, her arm across my chest so I couldn't move. I don't get scared often, but I was very frightened at this moment, to the point of speechlessness. I was also confused at the conversation I’d overheard, but then I knew I needed to know.

Although Amber's grip on me was strong and well-placed, she was tired and her energy soon faded, allowing me to gently slip out of her hold and guide her to a cushion. I sat her on her bed, and then she looked at me with a frazzled expression. Most surprising of all, streams began flowing freely from her face, her eyes red from the salty tears. I had never, ever seen Amber lose it so badly, so I did the only thing my mind - or heart - told me to do, and that was to hold her close and let her rest against my shoulder. The two of us sat like that for several moments, for each other's comfort.

"Amber, what's going on?" I asked her when she was making no noise and was leaning against me.

"What did you do to my butterfly?"

I sighed and said, "I’m really sorry. I heard you and your mother yelling and got surprised - I was just looking at it, and it broke..."

Amber sat up and looked at me, her mouth grim. "That woman is not my mother."

I regarded her expectantly.

"My mother died when I was ten. She loved butterflies," she choked out. "My father ran off somewhere before I was born, and I got stuck with that witch of a guardian, who cares about money over daughters, who wants to parade me in front of her female wannabe-Martha Stewarts. So she drags me off to some preppie private school - no offense Ty, but the school's snobbish at its best - so I can learn to be a cute lawyer with spectacles and a miniskirt. I decided to spite her by not being social like she was in her little circle. it wasn't my mom's money after all. At least I was able to save that one butterfly before they auctioned off our house.

"I’ve... tried to recreate what my mom had on our mantle, but a lot of it was sold. That butterfly was her favourite, and… now it's gone."

Of course, that was when I felt guilt beyond comparison, even without her stony eyes on me. I felt awful, like some monster. I was pondering how to make it up to her, knowing it was impossible but I still had to try, when instinct took over and I was close enough to taste the tears on her cheeks.

She broke away from me and asked croakily, "why are you so kind to me, Ty? I’m not special, or pretty or popular like all those other girls who chase after you. I’m not rich and my family doesn't have influence or anything like that."

"You really think so?" I retorted.

Amber just shrugged.

"Forget it," I said. "You’ll find out later. So where did your um… caretaker go?"

"Probably to get a drink," Amber muttered coldly, getting up and inspecting the damage the floor, or rather I, had done to the butterfly.

She sat cross-legged next to the broken pieces; her hands picking them up as if she wanted to put them back together. I watched her silently as she ran her fingers over each piece, gathering them in a small pile.

Amber then twisted around to face me. Slowly, she said, "This is stupid. The story of my life - a porcelain butterfly of my mother's. Broken. Like me, only inside."

I quickly assured her that was not the case. She disagreed by grabbing me by the arm and excusing herself when she shoved me out the door. Out on the front porch, I apologized again and asked her what was going on.

"You’ll see, Ty," she said, and I felt strange seeing an impish smile on her lips. "Actually, you'll be the first to know. I’ll have Machiavelli's biography to you by Monday. Please go. What I’m about to do isn't exactly virtuous, but I need to take advantage of an empty house."

Nodding politely, I kissed her on the cheek. She waved and went back inside.

She was absent from school on Monday, but sent the Machiavelli biography to me by email. But she didn't show the day after that, or the next. I didn't see her for three weeks.

Later, I found out from a happy Amber that she had been raiding all her foster mother's important documents that she kept in the house and on her computer. She told me she should have felt guilty, but she couldn't stand her foster mother more than she could throw me. She’d contacted lawyers after she found copies of her mother's will (stashed in the attic inside a safe, Amber said, as if Ellen was hoping she'd never find it), and endured a three-week court battle with Ellen and her lawyers, who claimed the will was invalid. But she won. And although Ellen was the property guardian of her mother's finances, Amber had turned 18 and could do whatever she wanted with it.

"I just never thought of it before," Amber was saying, leaning against my locker door as I stashed my books away at the end of the day. "Why I went through all that. My mother told me about it before she died, saying I should look for it or call her lawyer, Mr. Doherty. I feel so stupid."

I grinned and took off my tie, putting it away. "So what happens now?"

She gave me the first real smile I ever saw. It was entrancing, eyes that matched her smile, full of light. Every time I’d seen her before she harboured the look of sadly beautiful, but now there seemed to be a magical transformation. She was a vivid and happy young woman, almost radiating light from her skin. No longer did she wear her hair over her eyes - it was cut and groomed, and no longer did complain about the school uniform. I was, I admit, a little empty at the change of the eccentric girl I once knew, but after five minutes in her presence, I knew I’d like her.

At long last, the butterfly had risen from her cocoon. And she had finally begun to fly.