Safe And Sound

She fluttered and floated effortlessly in the sky, in and out of the trees she darted, coasting, soaring, till I could no longer follow her path.

I wondered if that was intentional, if she needed some time to be, just a butterfly. Maybe she was hiding from me, playing an elusive game of hide and seek, where I am always the seeker, and she is always the beautiful prize to find.

It was late March, and the weather had been unseasonably warm, and nature did what nature does: It began its rebirth. I was out on the sidewalk, writing in my journal. I remember - because Jenny Newham and her stupid friends were outside too. Jumping rope and making up songs about the sunshine. When I began to sing along, they mocked me and moved further down the sidewalk, so I wouldn’t be able to hear them, or they, me. Abandoned, and alone, again.

As I kicked the steps in frustration, I saw her - crawling up the black metal banister. I giggled, thinking she would make a strange looking zebra. Wearing her bright yellowy orange and black stripes on what looked like a white jumpsuit. I put my finger on the rail in front of her, at first, she stopped, trying to find a way around my finger. Then, she began to crawl onto my finger, making her way across my palm and up my forearm. I smiled, mostly because it tickled, but also because I had made a new friend, and she wanted to be with me.

Mom called me in for dinner.

As I prepared to put her back on the banister, I noticed a black bird watching. If birds licked their lips, that’s what it was doing. I knew I couldn’t leave her outside; she would be dinner before the sun went down. Which in early March is early. So, after some pleading, and finding the right container to keep her in, mom said I could keep her - for a while.

She was amazing, and grateful. She ate every bit of lettuce and milkweed I offered to her. After a few google searches, I learned that the Monarch caterpillars were voracious eaters, and they can gain about 2700 times their original weight. I knew then that we would be lifelong friends, I also liked to eat, a lot, and everyone knew it. Another reason Jenny was so mean to me, they used to invite me to sit at their table, and then sneak things into my food, making fun of me because I didn’t notice, and still ate it, or they would spill my tray on the floor, on purpose. I was really growing sick of mean.

Anyway, I also learned that the surface of a Monarch's wing is covered with thousands of tiny, colorful scales. So, she was as prepared as a mighty dragon - because her scaly wings would help her soar. Much like the dragons in the books I love to read, monarch scales improve lift, helping them make their long-distance journeys. The more I learned about her, the more I loved and admired her. I hoped when she was ready to soar away, that she would want me to go along. Surely, she would.

Every night as we slept, I left a heat lamp on in her enclosure and played soft gentle music, something to make her feel more at home. Waterfalls and gentle breezes, and it seemed to be working, she was growing bigger every day. I realized that I had run out of milkweed, her favorite food. So, I decided to go to the woods and find some more for her. Mom stopped me at the door and said it was a bad idea, the weather was turning bad, and the weatherman discouraged anyone from going out in it. I knew she would need it for her protection, I had to do it, for my friend.

She had been with me now for some time and was not moving around very much at all anymore. I thought the milkweed would make her feel better. As I packed her into a traveling container to keep her dry, I noticed she was still hiding, staying under a large leaf, and had surrounded herself with some very soft, stringy webs for several days. Kind of like I do when I don’t feel well, with my comforter and pillows. I knew I couldn’t make this journey without her, so I put her gently into my backpack and snuck quietly out of my bedroom window.

The weatherman was right, the rain was practically falling sideways. It was very hard to see where I was going. I turned off the sidewalk and onto the dark, dirt path - a short cut, that went from our neighborhood - to the preschool. Behind the preschool was a large, wooded area, there would be plenty of milkweed there. As I was walking the dark pathway, I heard footsteps behind me, tapping into the mud puddles. Every time I turned around, they stopped too. After a few times, I hollered out:” I know you’re there and you don’t scare me, I have a monarch - dragon scale protecting me, so you can go away!”

I could hear breathing and feet scuffing on the path behind me, but it was so dark, my eyes could not focus. A bolt of lightning flashed and hit a tree, causing it to fall across the path. The flash revealed a dark shadowy figure standing on the other side of the fallen tree. I panicked and began to run, tripping in a hole - I fell to the ground. I hadn’t zipped my backpack well and the butterfly case went flying into the darkness. I could hear it tossing and turning, and before I could find where it had landed, someone grabbed me up and carried me through the playground and into the woods.

When I woke up, everything hurt. I squinted into the darkness trying to see where I was. I heard fluttering against my raincoat. I couldn’t believe my eyes, somehow, she had emerged from her chrysalis and managed to cling to me. My only friend, with me when I needed her most. My Monarch dragon-scale. She lightly floated onto my cheek; I felt her tiny feet caressing my brokenness, I felt peaceful and cold, remembering when I first found her, or did she find me?

After meeting her on the stoop of my apartment building and caring for her all summer, watching her changing and evolving right in front of my eyes. That mysterious and magnificent transformation. Maybe it was a way to keep from changing myself. I never really fit in, always the odd man out, as they say. Trying desperately to be me, while painfully failing at being like the others. But she made it seem so easy, she wiggled and squirmed, pressed and pushed her way out of what she was, into what she became. It was a horrifically beautiful transformation.

As I lay on the cold dark ground, broken into the little pieces he had left of me, I felt my body begin to rise.

Confused, and numb I rose, higher and higher. Until I saw my reflection in the window of the old shack behind the school.

I had wings.

Together, she and I disappeared into the dark sky, flying free above the clouds. We fluttered and floated effortlessly in the sky, in and out of the trees we darted, coasting, soaring, till no-one could follow our path.

Maybe it was intentional, I guess we needed some time to be, to fly. Playing an elusive game of hide and seek, where they would seek, and we were the beautiful prize to be found.