The Cries of the Butterfly - A LOVE STORY (4 page)

It was his daughter’s voice again that brought Sage back to the current.

“I want to talk to Wolfy-Dad,” she was saying, that moanfulness in her voice still very much in place.

“You know he is far away, so don’t be silly,” Frennie shot.

“But Daddy has celly, no!”

“His cellphone doesn’t work here!”

“How do you know?”

“Because it doesn’t!”

“Daddy, give me celly, let me see.”

Sage smiled, shaking his head mentally.
Gracious Lord!
There was no point bickering here. She would have her way in the end, Frennie’s short fuse notwithstanding. If they kept refusing, she’d ensure no one found any calm all trip.

He pulled out his handset from his shirt pocket, then pushed a button and listened. Wolf Butcher picked it up on the third ring. Big brother and little brother talked briefly, before a shrieking five year old girl, now settled back on her father’s lap, yanked the phone from him.

“Be brief!” Frennie thundered.

“Why didn’t you come with us, Wolfy-Dad?!” Philippa began to wail. Sage shut his eyes, wishing he’d brought his I-Pod.
How did I ever forget it?!

Oh, yes, he should’ve guessed the reason for his wife’s crabbiness this morning. They called it ‘Morning Sickness’.
And it is a result of a certain biological change that happens to a woman’s body,
Sage was thinking grandly.

They hadn’t told anyone yet; the plan was to announce it dramatically at Olivia’s, where the full family would be gathered.

They had found out only a couple of days ago and it had made Sage the happiest man on the planet. Frennie had been so ecstatic, she had run off to announce it to the world, and it had taken all of Sage’s persuasive powers to rein her in.

“Think of the thrill of declaring the news when
all
the Butchers are present,” he had said. “Moreover, can there be a more appropriate occasion than Olivia’s house-warming?”

Somehow he had prevailed. Just about. Privately, Sage had wanted to announce the news when Wolf was present. He ached to see his little brother’s face explode when finally Philippa becoming his legally became a concrete reality…when his long wait, the never-ending expectancy, was at last over. Of course, Philippa had always been his daughter, right from her very birth, yet Sage knew how much this trivial formality of getting it all on paper meant to Wolf. Sage exhaled.
Boy, is it going to be some moment to see my brother’s face bloom like a million suns in the sky when he is now told!
Yes, there would be a little sadness for Sage and his wife,
but only the slightest
, because
after all, it is all going to remain in the family
. Moreover…
we are going to have many, many more children hereafter
. So…all was good. Indeed
, everything is just great…magical!

Sage felt an overwhelming urge to turn around, reach out and touch his wife’s belly.
Oh, you wonderful, wonderful belle!

But in that very instant an image plunged down before him. It was an image of a woman. A little woman, a common, everyday woman, but a beautiful woman...with a beautiful smile. But it was a beauty that transcended the corporeal and set her apart from the countless other beautiful women of the world, because it had an indefinable quality to it. An unexplainable quality that had gladdened his heart and made him feel good simply being in her company.

And then Sage felt a huge wave...a veritable tsunami...of guilt bludgeon him, knocking him cold. It was a guilt so intense, it brought on a terrible fit. He felt his heart constrict fiercely and he couldn’t breathe anymore. His limbs began thrashing out as he hysterically gasped for air. And then his body began quaking violently. He could feel his bowels squeeze severely, then they relaxed and he began to lose complete control of them. Saliva began streaming down his mouth and he started to throw up in mounds. Then blood began rushing up madly to his head and engulfed his brain.

He was on the verge of passing out, when with a despairing lunge he somehow managed to haul in all his powers of will. Someway he succeeded in casting out the image of the woman, desperately banishing it from his consciousness, together with the unbearable guilt that had almost killed him.

It was only some moments later that Sage realized that he hadn’t budged at all while the fit had lasted, but had remained absolutely still...that in reality his limbs hadn’t thrashed in any way, nor had his body quaked, nor had he lost control of his bowels or vomited. Nothing had happened outwardly, beside that he had quietly sweated profusely. He realized that he hadn’t had a physical seizure at all—it was a fit of his soul. It had, however, left him completely exhausted. He now also recognized that no one else had seemed to notice what he’d been through and was he oh, so thankful for that.

Gracious Lord, I cannot live like this! Help me please, Jesus!
Sage pleaded silently, as he hurriedly wiped away the sweat before anyone noticed. For, this wasn’t the first time he’d had this fit. It had first started when Frennie had become pregnant with Philippa. And throughout her pregnancy, Sage had been stricken by these seizures. And now it had begun all over again with Frennie’s second conception.
Please stop this, Gracious Lord, oh please, or else just kill me! I cannot take it anymore...it is just too painful!

He wasn’t to know then that his prayer would shortly be answered.

A minute later, he had miraculously managed to fully restore himself. Like after every fit before, the instinct of self-preservation had triumphed, his defenses now completely blocking out the image of the woman from his psyche, albeit for the time being. And then he again registered the voices around him.

“Will you finish now, please? PLEASE!” It was his wife. She leaned forward and yanked the handset out of their daughter’s hand. Sage heard her talk briefly to Wolf, then she handed back the phone to Sage, even as Philippa let out a howl of protest.

“Be quiet...this very instant!” Frennie shouted. “If you don’t shut up, I’m getting the driver to turn the car around and we’re not going anywhere!”

That did it. For a short while, Philippa remained despondent (
bad Momma
), but soon the elation overflowed.

“Wolfy-Dad said he will meet me at the airport. Only few hours more now,” she said to her grandma, ignoring her mother.

“Good,” grandma said. “What else did he say?”

“Oh, he said so much. He said he will take me to see a movie shoot, and then to Disneyland and zoo. And he said that I was his sweet Butterfly and that he loves me very much...just too, too much.”

“That’s great. Are you happy now?”

Philippa’s little head bobbed up and down earnestly. “Yah. Very, very happy.”

And Sage could almost hear his wife exhale in a long stream of alleviation and say something to the effect:
now please keep your mouth shut for the rest of the trip, little girl!
But mercifully, she said nothing this time.

“Sir, can we please break for a minute. I need to go...very urgent.” It was the chauffeur, Knott.

Out in the open?!
But then who can defy the call of Nature? “Yes, of course,” Sage said. By his reckoning they were halfway to the airport.

As the driver pulled to the side of the road, Sage thought:
Perhaps we should have taken the chopper instead.
But his father, like often, had insisted they travel by road in their washed-up antique.

Five minutes transpired. Then seven.

What is this guy doing?
Sage wondered. Seven minutes for a pee? He remembered the day Knott had come to him begging for work. It had been a rather unorthodox petition. The fellow had brought along pictures of his family. Three sweet little daughters and a pleasing wife, with hope in their eyes and poverty on their person. It had been a desperate plea, from a desperate man. Knott had been truthful: he had been sacked from his last position of employment for drunken driving. Indeed, he had confessed to being a problem drinker. But that had been six months in the past. He had since cleaned up his act and ‘Butcher sir’ could have that ascertained anyway he deemed fit. Regularly, a person like Knott wouldn’t at all be eligible, but the man’s bare honesty, coupled with a thought for his family, had obliged Sage to give him a fresh start.
Everyone deserves a second chance in life…especially those not as blessed as us
.

Ten minutes had passed now since the fellow had gone off and Sage could hold back no more. He sat Philippa next to him and began to open the door. And then the guy reappeared.

Sage exhaled and pulled back.
Well, never mind.
He suddenly noticed that something had changed in the man since last time. Something in his gait, something in his entire deportment. That he kept his head carefully lowered, as if he didn’t want his face to be seen, was one of it. Sage’s antenna buzzed warningly. He almost moved over to the driver’s seat himself, but before he could, Knott opened his side of the door and Sage let it lie. It was a matter of a short time now; he didn’t want to hurt the man’s feelings unnecessarily. Nevertheless, Sage leaned a little toward him, as if to adjust his position, but he couldn’t smell any alcohol on Knott.

“Make it quick now, yes?” Sage said casually as the vehicle rolled back onto the expressway.

That somehow seemed to trigger Knott, and things happened very swiftly thereafter. Knott’s foot pressed hard on the gas and the Mercury squirted forward.

“Hey, you, easy!” Eric shouted from behind.

Something is wrong here...very, very wrong!
Sage thought.

“Okay, pull over, you!” Eric bellowed.

But the man was beyond control. Instead of braking, his leg smashed down on the accelerator still harder; instead of keeping to his side of the road, he swerved crazily to the other side, leaping over the median strip. The women in the rear began to scream.

Sage lunged sideward, making a wild grab for the steering wheel. Knott turned his head and stared with stupid, terror-stricken eyes at his boss. He gave a frightened yip and let go of the wheel. Eric Butcher reached over the front seat and gave Knott an almighty shove, ramming the chauffeur solidly against the driver-side door, even as he dove for the wheel himself. The ancient door gave a startled grunt and flung open, hurtling Knott out of the vehicle like a pathetic rag doll.

Father and son were frenziedly trying to regain control of the vehicle. But it was too late. The Mercury traversed the expressway like a feral meteor and went tearing into a large Banyan tree.

Sage’s last thought was no thought at all. His mind was just too fuzzed to comprehend anything. His skull was saturated with monster shrieks from every direction and all he could manage was to make a despairing grab for his little daughter. But he couldn’t find her. Then a blinding flash of lightening socked his brain, like a hundred silver spears, and Sage Butcher blacked out.

***

That same year...Wednesday, April 12...

THE
playground of St. Teresa Children’s Home, an orphanage, was flourishing this warm evening. It was closing in on six pm and the sun would not call it quits for an hour still.

Sister Toynette Severin Bracko, age fifty-two, sat with her deputy, Sister Clara, twenty-seven, on red modular chairs under a shade tree and watched the kids play.

There were no divisions here—the boys and the girls played as one. There were five separate groups this evening, spread out over the large ground, and the one nearest to the Sisters were playing a strange mix of football and tag. One girl, especially, kept catching Sister Toynette’s attention. Her name was Robin and she was six and a half years old. She was smaller than all others she played with, but what engrossed Sister Toynette was her boundless energy and athleticism. She chased the ball relentlessly, beating boys twice her size to its possession.

The ball was kicked by a biggish boy this time. It soared in the air, then curled and descended, and disappeared into a largish brush near the compound wall. While all the kids chased it, they stopped short on the fringe of the six feet high thicket, even the boys, suddenly too scared to venture in. But Sister Toynette saw Robin dash in without any hesitation. For a moment she disappeared, then re-emerged, ball in hand, a triumphant look in her blue eyes, and a lot of dirt on her clothes. Sister Toynette beckoned her.

“Be careful,” she said, after she had dusted the girl with her hands.

Brave girl,
the Sister thought, thinking also that the brush along the compound wall had grown too big and badly needed attention. But the gardener, an aging fellow called Alan Gower, had gone down with a serious bout of typhoid and recovery was taking just too long. Sister Blessing, head of the Children’s Home, had insisted that she would wait for Gower, an old hand who’d been with the Home from the very beginning.

As Sister Toynette watched Robin, she thought what sort of a mother would abandon a child so pretty and vibrant. She was easily the best kid in the Home and not just for her physical abilities. She unfailingly placed first in her class every time.

The ball went into the bush once again and inevitably Robin it was who went in to retrieve.
She is a natural leader,
Sister Toynette told herself, watching the girl rematerialize in a jiffy, ball in hand. She watched her kick the ball, which went flying toward the heavens with surprising power. Sister Toynette and Sister Clara exchanged smiles.