Butterfly (20 page)

“But now they hate me!” Tears leap the brink and skid down Plum’s cheeks — she hits them away forcefully. Her resolution to be star-like has crashed to earth already. She
wants
to have friends, even friends whom she doesn’t like and who aren’t always nice to her: having even
those
friends was better than being outcast and alone. She isn’t strong or unconventional or stupid enough to survive this, she is going to die, she would
rather
be dead than live amongst the shards of this life. “They won’t talk to me,” she weeps. “Everyone’s whispering about me. No one’s going to be my friend.”

Maureen doesn’t say,
Don’t be silly.
She says, “Whatever you did that caused this, you are still a good person, Aria. Don’t let them make you think that you aren’t.”

An ursine noise comes from Plum —“hunuh!”— as if she’s been knocked over. Tears flood down her cheeks, more tears than she’s ever cried before. The prospect of recounting what happened at the party makes her feel bilious, makes the tears flow faster and brews another
hunuh
in her chest — yet she
must
tell, she’s committed to telling, because otherwise the story will grow in her stomach like the hair-and-toothed tumor she once saw on TV. She needs someone to take the horror and hammer it into laughable
particles which can be swept away. “Tell me what happened,” Maureen prompts. “Maybe things aren’t as ruined as you imagine.”

“They are!” Plum’s face crumples, and while David concentrates on the countertop and Maureen watches through eyes soft with concern, she wallows without caring that her face looks ugly and that her nose is blowing bubbles: she wants to cry, she has a
right
to cry, she’s only fourteen and her life is ended, and she might have bawled all afternoon if Maureen had not said, “Aria, stop now. Crying fixes nothing, and you’re scaring David.” And her reluctance to frighten the little boy makes Plum sniff her desolation back into her head, makes her wipe her wet cheeks and soppy chin. “Sorry, Davy,” she sighs, “it’s all right,” and the boy shoots a glance at her, deeply unsure. It isn’t all right, but Plum has come too far to retreat. Her eyes roll around miserably until they fix on the tea towel folded over the oven rail. If she had other personalities, like Sybil in
Sybil,
she could make one of
them
tell the story; instead she must tell it herself, glaring at the tea towel with terrible eyes.

“I took some things from my friends. Not expensive things — little things. A yo-yo, and a penny, and a tiny glass lamb. A broken watch — that was Rachael’s. An Abba badge that belonged to Dash. A charm bracelet from Sophie — it was her lamb, too. A jade necklace — not a fancy one. I was keeping them in a briefcase underneath my bed. At my party, they found the case.”

“Ouch!” says Maureen. “I bet that took the fizz out of the lemonade.”

The girl glances up shyly. “They were really angry.”

“I’m sure they were! I’m sure they were delighted by the chance to be angry, too. I assume you had a reason for taking these things?”

Plum’s gaze swings back to the towel. “It’s hard to explain.” Her mouth pinches, and tears spill again. “I thought that if I had these objects where I could see them and touch them and — sort of —
influence
them, I might make things
different
— I could make myself important, and they would
want
me to be their friend, they’d be
proud
that I’m their friend, and I wouldn’t be so — kind of —
weak
all the time. I could be — sort of —
in charge,
sometimes. Or at least — not always on the bottom.”

Maureen smiles around the mug’s rim. “I think you’ve been watching too many voodoo movies in the middle of the night.”

Plum swallows hard. “I guess. It was stupid.”

“It wasn’t stupid. It’s not a crime to want respect. You shouldn’t be ashamed of that. Perhaps you went about trying to get it the wrong way, that’s all.”

The unfairness of the world rises up in her throat. “I didn’t even
want
the dumb necklace! I didn’t want an ugly badge or a broken watch or any of that junk! I just —
needed
—”

“I know,” soothes Maureen. “I understand. You needed
secret weapons. But you knew it wasn’t going to work, didn’t you? You know you can’t change things just by touching a penny. All you’ve done is given your friends an excuse to make you more unhappy than they were already doing.”

The girl’s eyes leap to the woman’s face, desperate for the wise words that will return light to her world. Maureen lets her thrash in darkness for a drawn-out moment before announcing, “You’re better off without them, Aria. They’re no loss to you.
You
are a loss to
them.
They’ll understand this one day, but then it will be too late because we don’t go back, we don’t forgive. School will be a difficult place for you now — but it’s always been difficult, hasn’t it? You’re strong, and you’ll just have to get stronger. And you’ll always have me, Aria. If it’s any comfort, I promise I will always be your friend. No matter
what
you do.”

The relief is so tremendous that a moan is pressed from Plum. “Thank you,” she sighs. Then laughs wheezily: “I’m always saying
thank you
to you.”

“You needn’t. I’ve told you before: I’m glad we’re friends.”

“You don’t think I’m awful?”

“For stealing from your friends?” Maureen takes a Butternut Snap from the plate and breaks it into parts. “Do
you
think you’re awful?”

“Only a little bit. Not much.”

“I agree. I think you’re naughty, but I don’t think you’re awful.”

Naughty
makes Plum chuckle. She takes a biscuit, sits
straighter, pulls a funny face at the boy. Her eyes are drying, her heart is buoyed: to Maureen she confesses, “I was scared to tell you. I thought you’d hate me.”

“I’m honored you told me. It shows you trust me.”

“I do trust you!” A speck of Butternut Snap jumps to the counter. “I’d rather have you as my
only
friend than have
ten
of those others!”

“Thank you,” says Maureen. “And I trust you. Shall I tell you my secret, in exchange for yours?”

“Ooh!” Plum has not expected this, and hunkers forward. “Yes! Tell me!”

“All right.” Maureen smiles. “Aria: your brother Justin and I are involved. We have a relationship — do you understand? We love one another. We have done for a long time.”

She tells it plainly, so the girl won’t be confused, yet Plum stares as if she’s never possessed a brother Justin, never encountered this word
love.
Bafflement crosses from one eyebrow to the other: she asks, “Are you going to get — married?”

“I think so. Probably.”

“But what about your husband?”

Maureen grimaces. “These things happen, Aria.”

Plum feels as if she’s opened her bedroom window to discover not the familiar view of roofs and mountains, but a world weirder than the deepest sea. The tea towel, the kettle, the shining sink are all utterly bizarre. The blackbird calling outside is a sound she’s never heard. Even Maureen
is suddenly a stranger, a woman about whom Plum knows nothing. There are probably grand things that should be said, but she doesn’t know what they are. “What about him?” she asks, of the child at her elbow.

Maureen frowns. “David will be fine.”

The jabbering discord of Plum’s confusion clears for an instant: “I’ll be his auntie,” she realizes. “I’ll be your auntie,” she tells the boy. “You’ll be my nephew, Davy! And your mummy — she’ll be my sister-in-law! Won’t that be good? You can live here, and I’ll live next door, and we can see each other every day!”

The boy smiles uneasily, looks across at his mother. “I’m not sure about that, Aria,” says Maureen. “It might be Bernie who stays in this house.”

“What?” Plum gapes. “What? No! I want you to stay here! Where would you go?”

“Possibly to Berlin,” Maureen replies. “Justin and I have discussed it.”

It takes Plum a moment to locate the city on the map, but when she does she is appalled. “But — that’s so far away! How will you and Justin be together, if you go to Berlin?”

Maureen laughs fondly. “Aria, you’re so quaint. Justin will be coming to Berlin too. We’ll be going together. We’re going to rent an apartment. We’ve discussed it, I told you.”

The girl stares while the revelation runs through her like spillage down a drain. “Justin can’t go to Berlin,” she says.

“No? Why can’t he?”

“Because —” Plum fumbles. “Because he’s my brother!”

“Aria,” says Maureen. “You can’t keep him forever.”

Plum peers, dumbfounded, into this new upturned world. Words lunge out of her: “When? When are you going?”

“As soon as we’re able. Very soon, I hope.”

Plum’s mouth opens and shuts. Everything is helter-skelter. Her eyes feel pulled unnaturally wide, her ears hear a hollow ring. Her whole body hurts like it’s been thrown into a wall. This is the worst thing that’s ever happened to her. “I don’t want Justin to go away,” she says, in a voice like a gravel road. “I don’t want
you
to go away, either. What about me?”

“Oh Aria, you’ll be fine. I know you — I know how strong you are. You think you’re not, but you
are.
And you can visit during school holidays — wouldn’t you like that?”

“No,” says Plum. “I’d like it better if you stayed here.”

“I know.” Maureen winces. “But it’s all planned now. Maybe, when you’re old enough, you could spend a few months with us, or even a year? I’d love that — wouldn’t you?”

The prospect sparks no enthusiasm in Plum: she sits like a toy that’s been too tightly wound, packed with energy yet paralyzed, her gaze flat and unseeing. “I didn’t know about any of this.”

“No, but you almost did! Do you remember thinking that Justin had a secret? Well,
I’m
his secret. Everything I’ve
just told you is our secret. No one knows about any of this yet — you’re the first. Isn’t that exciting?”

Plum is being hit by waves of shock that are knocking her down and tumbling her over, making it difficult to think; in the distance is rising the greatest wave, which will arrive in wrath and thunder. This tidal wave is sucking the oxygen from the room, leaving her, for the moment, muted and suppressed. “I was going to take David to the park,” she says.

“Yes, you were!” Maureen stands quickly, as if she too senses the coming torrent. “David, go with Aria. It’s a nice afternoon for the park.”

Plum waits outside on the porch while the child’s shoes are found. The tidal wave is coming and she doesn’t try to escape it, but waits with a simmering calm. She squints up at the sky, which has lost its cloudiness and cleared to pale blue. “Be a good boy for Aria,” Maureen tells her son; and the great wave blocks the light of the sun when Plum thinks,
I hate that name, Aria.

Justin stays out of the way while Cydar makes the deal, strolling alone down the dim corridors as he does every time his brother persuades him to come out to this warehouse which is as temperate as an island, surreal as LSD. Hundreds of fish tanks line the aisles along which Justin walks, hands in pockets, stopping occasionally to admire an octopus or a turtle or, on one memorable occasion, a
medium-sized crocodile. “Buy the crocodile,” Justin had urged, but Cydar had said, “No,” without even trying to pretend he might. This place is all business, for Cydar. If Justin listened to the conversation being conducted between his brother and the undefinably distasteful man who owns the warehouse, he would hear numbers slamming their heads together like rams, bargains driven home like fists. The first time he’d heard such cool gray language from his brother, Justin had been startled. He’d assumed the fish were pets to Cydar. “Won’t you miss them?” he’d asked that day, trailing his brother out to the car; Cydar was riffling through a wad of notes and didn’t look up to answer, “Nothing’s irreplaceable.”

In every visit since, Justin has walked the aisles with their concrete floors and their walls made of glass, saying little and thinking less, feeling the weight of wet air in his lungs, slowing but not stopping when some peculiar creature catches his eye. The tanks are glowingly lit, stacked high upon one another like ingots. If he passes the gangly kid who cleans the tanks, Justin will say, “How you doing,” and the kid in his damp T-shirt will answer, “G’day.” Other than this, Justin bites back his opinion, for it’s that kind of place, like a cemetery. The churning of filters is like the reciting of prayers. He hears but makes no comment on what’s being said in the corner near the till; he waits for Cydar to find him among the heavenly aisles, then asks, as if it isn’t obvious, “Ready?” Sometimes, on the way to the door, he’ll point out an interesting specimen.
Cydar assesses the beast in a glance, unfailingly keeps walking.

Today Justin’s thoughts won’t be stilled, as they usually are when at the fish dealer’s. He casts his mind off like a boat, only to have it nudgingly return. He should not have talked to Maureen in the front garden this morning. She’s in his life the way the warehouse air is in his chest, invasive, too heavy. He should have turned his back on her. From now on he will; he’s impatient to. But he should have done so this morning.

“Let’s go.” Cydar’s suddenness makes Justin jump. In this aquatic world, he is a cat. The twin white buckets are swinging empty at his knees, his pockets will be plugged with cash he’ll use not in a free and joyful way, but coldly, reasonedly. Justin waves a hand down a fog-lit aisle: “Come and see. There’s this fish called a sargrassy or something —”

“Sargassum,” says Cydar. “No. We’ve got things to do.”

Justin sighs, and heads for the door; but he could do with a touch of Cydar’s hard-bittenness. It would make life cleaner, less tatty. And Cydar, thinks Justin, has some ruthlessness to spare.

Plum walks David to the milk bar because she needs something sugary in her mouth: two slabs of coconut ice are dropped in a paper bag, along with three Sherbet Bombs that use up the last of her change. They go then to the playground in the park, where Plum and the boy sit side-by-side
on the bench in the shade of the plane tree. The grass looks fresh and glossy, and at the edge of the tanbark bees chug from daisy to daisy. “Be careful of the stings,” Plum warns the child. “Here,” she says, pushing into his hand a chunk of coconut ice. David feeds it without hesitation into a corner of his mouth. “Do you like it?” Plum asks — he nods and answers, “Hmm-hmm.” His small mild presence is keeping the cataclysmic wave at bay, but the longer it waits, the stronger it grows. The children both eat methodically, contemplating the empty playground. “Swing?” Plum suggests, when David’s finished the confection and is shaking coconut from his fingers in a finicky, disgusted way. They cross the tanbark to where the swings dangle from their chains, and he fits himself with neatness onto the wooden seat.