Sunflower Butterfly

Every morning she woke up with to the painting on her ceiling, a painting that she created herself. Her two favorite things, a sunflower, and a butterfly. The Sunflower has a gold tint to its petals with the signature black center. The blue butterfly was a nice contrast to the golden yellow flower. Justine was always a talented artist and always came in first place in the children’s art shows. The painting she was currently admiring, she painted at just 14 years old. She had a hard time trying to convince her mom to let her paint the ceiling. Finally, after ensuring that paint would not drip onto the beige carpet or her queen size bed, her mother gave in. After 3 days the painting was finished, and only one drop got on the carpet.

Mom will never see it; I’ll just move my desk over it. What mom doesn’t know won’t hurt her, she thought to herself.

That was five years ago; Justine still admires her work claiming that the sunflower painting is her best work. Aside from the few friends that visit, and her parents, Justine has never shown this painting to anyone, she did not want her serenity to be the new trendy house decoration. Which is why she is currently staring at this painting after a long night of insomnia.

Last night when Justine went to bed, she found a picture of her ceiling on her bed. She thought that maybe someone came by and took a picture. At first, she was upset that someone might try to sell her artwork as their own, but why would they leave a picture on her bed? She flipped the picture over and saw that there was red writing on the back.

June 12, 8:00pm

Red barn

Justine had no idea what the date or the red barn meant. She had called her friends and asked her parents if they left a picture on her bed. No one had owned up to leaving it. June 12th was tomorrow, or today since it was now 3 am. Justine ran through all her appointments and meetings, she didn’t have anything scheduled at 8:00. She thought about invitations, but she was not invited to any parties or get togethers, not for the 12th. She laid there thinking about what the date or red barn meant but nothing was coming to mind.

Before she knew it, the sun was rising. She debated getting out of bed or trying to get some sleep when she was interrupted by a text message from her best friend, Joey. Joey and Justine have been friends since Justine moved into the neighborhood, it sounds cliché, but she was the girl next door.

You know those stories that your mom tells you to warn you about the bad boys? Justine is pretty sure that half those stories were about Joey. He had all the girlfriends, he skipped school, he got in fights, he was just bad. Though he was bad, he was also kindhearted. He had girlfriends but Justine knew that he never cheated on them, he skipped school to help a friend who was sick, the fights were to protect those who couldn’t protect themselves. Yeah, he had a bad boy image but only Justine knew the real Joey. Joey, however, likes to keep the image up.

Joey was tall, the opposite of Justine. He always made fun of her when she asked him to reach for something on the second shelf, his favorite was calling her a fairy. “What’s the matter little fairy, can’t reach that glass?” He would always joke around with her, and she returned the gesture by saying something along the lines of, “Yeah beanstalk, just get me the damn glass before I cut you down.” That was the way their friendship was. They joked and laughed at each other, but they were always there when they were needed.

Joey: What are you doing tonight?

Justine: Nothing, why?

Joey: Party tonight, starting early at 6 pm, Luke’s house.

Justine: Luke? I hate Luke.

Joey: Come on, it’ll be fun. I’ll be there and I won’t let Luke get near you.

Justine: FINE, but I will double fist nut punch you, if he talks to me.

Joey: No you won’t. I’ll pick you up at 6.

Justine: Isn’t the party at 6?

Joey: Yeah, but we don’t get to parties early.

Justine: *eye roll* See ya.

Joey: *kiss face*

Justine got out of bed and got ready for her day. She hoped that Joey stuck to his word about Luke. Luke once asked her on a date and when she declined, he got a little physical with her. He grabbed her arm and pushed her back into a wall, she ended up having a bruise and a headache. Since then, he would just stare at her, it really creeped her out. She told Joey about the incident but told him not to do anything to Luke. She was worried that Luke would retaliate, not on Joey but on herself. From then she tried to avoid him, it seemed to work…mostly. There were still times she would run into him, like at school or the store. Now that she is thinking about it, it seems like he was almost everywhere she was when she was out shopping. School is one thing, and though the town isn’t huge, it seems unlikely to run into the same person EVERYTIME you were out doing something.

A horn honking shook her out of her thoughts. Her phone beeped with a notification, it was Joey.

Joey: COME ON!

Justine rolled her eyes and gave herself one more look in the mirror. She decided to leave her shoulder length brown hair natural, she used to hate it but now she loves the way her curls give her a beachy wave. She glanced at her black tank top and yoga pants; she was not going to dress up any more than she had to. She slipped on her sandals and headed out the door.

“Did you do something different with your eyes?” Joey asked, “they seem to be more green than brown. Oh contacts, you got contacts, didn’t you?”

She laughed and shook her head, “No, I didn’t do anything. I don’t like contacts; these are just my natural eyes. You would know that if you looked at them when you talked to me, instead of looking at your phone.”

“Yeah, yeah. Look little fairy, you are beautiful, and I always look at you.”

They shared a look before Joey put the car in gear.

Justine could feel someone watching her, she looked around and didn’t see anyone looking at her. I’m probably just on edge because of Luke, she thought. She didn’t see him when she was looking around, maybe that was a good sign. She tried to relax and enjoy the party. Luke never approached, maybe that was Joey’s doing, or maybe he was preoccupied with something else. She looked at her watch and noticed that it was 1 am.

“Joey, I want to go home. I have to go see someone about some art in the morning.”

Joey looked at her and could see that she was being honest, “Alright, let me go say bye to some people and then we will go to the car. Here are my keys if you want to head over there.”

She took the keys and headed down the path. The party was at Luke’s house but they had to park on a side road and take a pathway to get to the actual house. She was admiring the stars and wondering if she should paint them next. She didn’t hear him until it was too late.

Justine felt a blow to the back of her head before everything went black.

Justine regained conscious to a man….no, not a man, it was Luke. Luke was talking to her.

“Bitch, you think that you can turn me down. You think that Joey will save you. He’s been onto me ever since I asked you out.”

“Luke? What are you doing?”

“Well, I’m going to kill you. If I can’t have you, Joey doesn’t deserve to get you. I always get what I want, and I want you. I’m not willing to share and Joey is too strong for me to take out. But you, ‘little fairy’,” Luke mocked, “you are a fairy, tiny and weak.”

Justine listened to his words, she looked around and saw a red barn. She couldn’t take her eyes off of the barn. “Red barn”, she whispered.

“So, you did get my message, I’m sorry the time was off, but you showed up late and Joey wouldn’t leave your side,” he explained. “I was going to do this at 8, right as the sun was setting, it would have been beautiful.” He paused a moment to look at the barn before he turned his attention back to Justine.

“You are beautiful, but if I can’t have you, no one will. I’ll try to make this as painless as possible,” he taunted.

Justine ran toward him, scratching his face and pulling his hair. She was still lightheaded from the hit to her head and started to lose balance. She felt another hit to her head and fell to the ground. She thought that she heard someone yell her name, but she was too weak to look around. Instead, she looked at that red barn one more time before everything went black.