The Butterfly

I've loved butterflies since a young age. When I was a little girl, people would ask me what my favorite animal was and I would excitedly jump up and say it was a butterfly. I always liked how free they seemed. My mom told me that if a butterfly landed on you that it was good luck. I remembered that for my entire life. A butterfly was good luck. I always trusted the butterfly and its beauty.

Maybe that's why I trusted him and trusted that he was one of the good guys. He had the butterfly on his throat and I was always infatuated with it. I thought that it was beautiful and while he was damaged and there were dark rumors surrounding him, I thought that he was beautiful. His smile could make me weak in the knees. He was just supposed to be a friend—my boyfriend's best friend. He actually introduced us—isn't that a bit ironic? I don't know if ironic is the right word. I have all of eternity to figure it out now. He left me here.

I never thought that this would be a possibility. I had hopes and dreams. I had a love for everything and a passion for life. I just figured out where I wanted my life to go and thought that everything was in order. My boyfriend told me to stay away from him. There was no reason for me to be near him. My boyfriend would panic about it. There was some infidelity, but we were working through it. We had just rented our new house together, and everything was going according to plan. I was so excited for my future.

I always wanted to take on the personality of a butterfly, bring luck to the people that I touched. I wanted to bring them love. I guess in the end, I was more of the moth and he was the flame. My boyfriend begged me to stay away from him, but I couldn't. I would "accidentally" put myself in situations where he was. I would go to parties where I knew that he was going to be and tell my boyfriend that I was going somewhere else. I guess that's how I ended up here.

He always told me that someday he was going to give me a butterfly tattoo on my neck, just like his. I didn't expect it to be this way though. I didn't expect it to be with his bare hands. I scratched and fought, hoping that he would snap out of it. His eyes were black. He wasn't there. I'd seen that look before one other time but he walked away from me that time. This time, we were in my car, and he was on top of me with his hands wrapped around my throat. I did everything I could and struggled to make him stop. I was slipping in and out of consciousness, then finally, I took in my last breath, thinking of my mother, my boyfriend, my friends. They wouldn't let him get away with this. They would find me. He wouldn't get away with what he did.

I was looking down at him now, looking down at myself. It was the first time that I actually saw myself without looking in the mirror. I saw the bruise already forming around my neck. I guess it really did look like a butterfly. It changed my perspective on the butterfly. The butterfly landing on you doesn't always mean luck. This one landed on me, and now I'm destined to wander here forever. There's nothing here after death.

He was just sitting there staring at my shell. I wanted to attack him. I tried so hard, hitting at him as hard as I could, my fists going straight through him. I knew that there was no damage that I could do to him. He pulled out his phone and called someone saying that he needed help, that he stepped out of his body and he did something that he shouldn't have done. He said that he lost his temper and couldn't stand it. He was telling the person that I told him that things were over and I just wanted my life to be straight and narrow. He told them that he couldn't take it—he loved me and I was leaving him.

Maybe that was his trigger all along—when someone left him. Abandonment issues. I knew that he had the issues, but I never thought that he would hurt me. I never thought that he would do anything to cause me this hurt. I never thought he would do anything to cause my boyfriend this hurt. My boyfriend was his best friend—his brother. How could this be happening?

How could he put an end to my life and just talk on the phone like it was nothing? How could he say he loved me after what he just did to me? How could he? Maybe even butterflies can be monsters.