Authors: Naomi Fraser
“I’m glad I met you, Ellie. We
have a lot in common. Are you looking forward to today?”
Warmth suffuses my cheeks, and I
try to steady myself by putting on my game face. How can Lakyn be glad he met
me? What do I offer him? “As long as we don’t have to cut up butterflies, I’ll
be peachy,” I say, smiling with the hope he’ll open up more and regain his
happy expression.
“Do you enjoy science?” he asks.
“Studying Earth nature?”
“Sure.” But sometimes we have to
do some gross things in science. Cut up frogs. Learn chemistry.
Late yesterday afternoon,
Mrs.
Sciapoli
, our science
teacher told us we were going to investigate the life cycle of a butterfly.
Fly, fly,
fly
away. I can picture a beautiful
butterfly, maybe blue or orange. What must they think stuck inside their
habitats? Maybe it’s:
Is this all there is to life?
Yesterday, we saw spiky black
slugs.
Caterpillars that spent a week and a bit in a hotel,
chomping through green leaves in wide, deep-netted containers.
Going
crazy, making holes the width of pens as they punctured green leaves.
Today, we’ll see the real thing
at the breeders. I’ve always been curious about how a butterfly came to be. How
long it lived.
The strands of Lakyn’s hair shine
in the reflection of the sun peeking through the clouds. I contemplate him,
comparing him to all the other boys in my classes. He’s bigger.
Taller.
His shirt hangs in a straight shot from his broad
shoulders, past his flat stomach and tucks into the waist of his shorts. His
legs barely fit in the floor space in front of his seat. His thighs are muscly,
but slightly different from the other boys near him, even the buff ones. Now
that I really look at him, I can see he’s built, athletic and sublime.
“Do you work out?” I blurt.
“I swim.” He laughs and his teeth
gleam white and even. His eyes are no longer large; they’ve returned to normal
size. “I love the water.”
I scratch my temple, and not
wanting to mention his eyes again, I pull out my iPhone,
then
press the buds into my ears. I scroll to one of my favourite playlists. I’m
still looking for a song to relax to, when my phone rings. I pull out the
earphones and look at the caller ID. Cal.
I hit the answer button and speak
quietly, “Hey, Cal. What’s up?”
“Eloise.” His voice is hesitant
over the phone. “Sorry if I’ve caught you while you’re at school. I’ve been
meaning to call you. How have you been?”
“Great.
Yourself?”
“Not bad. The reason I’m calling you
is to let you know you are invited to a barbeque tonight at my place. It’s my
mum’s birthday.”
Shock paralyses me. “Err . . . um
. . . I’m staying at Bethany’s.”
“She’s invited, too,” Cal says.
“It’s just a few family and friends. Beth knows, but she must have forgotten to
tell you. My mum wanted me to call you and let you know just in case. Aunt
Carrie will be bringing her own car, but she’ll have the back seat full, so
I’ll pick up you and Beth at seven.”
How thoughtful. “Well, OK. I’d
love to come.” I smile.
“Cool. See you then.”
“Bye.” I hang up and continue to
stare at the phone in my hand.
Lakyn moves into my line of
sight.
“Boyfriend?”
I jerk my head up. “What?”
His frown lightens to a smile.
“Guess not. Hey, that’s a cool gadget. What is it?”
I freeze for the second time.
I SWALLOW.
“WHA-AT?”
Lakyn shrugs, releasing the
strong scent of icy sea, musk and lavender. I can’t help inhaling deeply,
fighting the urge to slide closer across the bus seat and breathe in more of
his scent. The blue shirt tents across his broad chest and then stretches again
in a flat line. His biceps and forearms bulge with lean muscle, and he drops
his chin, partially hiding a small smile, yet revealing the dimple in his
granite jaw. His dirty blond hair tumbles over his forehead and his thick
golden-tipped lashes are a burnished slash against his perfectly tanned skin.
“Don’t look so shocked,” he
murmurs. “I mean, I’ve seen them at school and pictures of them on signs at the
shops. I just haven’t asked anyone what they’re for.”
“What. They’re.
For.”
Noise from the students at the rear of the bus becomes
a hum.
A low, rumbling ache in the back of my mind.
In
some part of my brain, I hear the students boast about their plans for the
weekend and other tall stories. That’s . . . normal.
Sane.
But this . . . my heartbeat thunders. “What game are you—?”
“Lakyn.
Lakyn!”
I glance over my shoulder and
then turn back with a groan. Megan, one of
Ashly’s
closest friends, slips down the bus aisle, convincing another girl to swap seats
before grabbing Lakyn’s arm. Wacky orders her to take her seat, but she nods
and leans across the aisle anyway. “What are you doing this weekend? Do you
wanna
come to my place Saturday night for a party?
Ashly
told me to invite you.”
His lashes flicker, but he barely
glances at Megan.
“Not sure yet.
I’m discussing
something with Ellie.”
Megan pulls back her head in
shock, her brow knits, and then she retracts her claws from his arm. “Well,
when you’re finished, let me know.” She smirks at me and settles back in the
seat, staring ahead.
Lakyn smiles at me reassuringly.
“What were you saying?”
“That’s going to get back to
Ashly
. But is it true?” I whisper. “You don’t know what
they are? Stop
playin
’.”
His brow furrows and he chews at
his nail. “Playing? Is it that hard to believe I don’t know?” he asks in a
speculative tone.
“It’s my smartphone.” Did I miss
something? “You know . . . smartphones?” I whisper.
He angles his body closer to
mine, twisting his hips so all Megan will see is his broad back. His knee
touches my thigh, and my breathing stalls.
Heat from his
body tears through my skirt until the reviving warmth trails up my body to my
cheeks.
The scent of him surrounds me.
His mouth parts, his glowing gaze
on my lips, and my mouth burns, then he looks back up to meet my eyes. “Smart .
. .
phones?”
He screws up his face in concentration and then considers
the device. “They’re smart?” He flips his hand in a cupping gesture. “May I?”
I hesitantly place my iPhone in his
hand and my trembling fingers trace his palm.
He jolts at the touch. My phone
slips between his hands.
“Ah, no.”
He fumbles and
grabs for the phone.
“Careful.” I sit up, but the
iPhone lands in his lap, and I exhale in relief. “The glass shatters easily,
and it’s expensive to replace. Mum will kill me if I break it.”
He shakes his head, and his long
fingers sketch the screen. “Sorry.” Then he sucks in a breath, his gaze on the
images as they turn with dizzying speed. “Wow.” He smiles, bent over and stares
at the phone. “What a fascinating piece of technology.”
I look at him with wide eyes and
whisper, “There’s no way you couldn’t have seen—”
“No.” His gaze sticks on the
phone. “It’s a long story. Some of the other kids at school have them. So yeah,
I’ve seen them.” He tosses me another quick grin, but it’s rather uneasy,
belying the sparkle in his blue eyes. “But not really seen them, if you know
what I mean. Thanks for letting me have a look now.”
“That’s OK,” I say. Then it hits
me. He’s an orphan. It drives me mad how the world can be so bloody twisted
sometimes. He’s never properly seen an iPhone because he grew up having
nothing. Luxuries, to those who have none, are from another world entirely. “I
can teach you how to use one,” I offer quietly. “It’s not hard once you get the
hang of it.”
He grins so wide, his dimple
makes my heart melt, and his eyes appear like dancing stars. The smooth,
chiselled line of his jaw and cheekbones are beautiful. Even the golden colour
of his skin reminds me of basking in the sun.
“Thank you. Can I get one of my
own? How do you do it?”
“Oh, well that’s a bit harder.
You can buy one outright, but if you want to use the Internet, you need to go
on a plan.
Although, you can do prepaid.
But either
way, it’s going to cost you.”
He narrows his eyes and tilts his
head, practicing holding the phone against his ear.
“Cost . .
. as in money?”
“Yes.” I stare at him, trying to
figure him out and find I’m chewing my fingernails. I tuck my fingers away to
watch him play with my phone.
He shrugs nonchalantly. “I have
money.”
He makes it sound as if we are
talking about socks in his underwear drawer. Considering he doesn’t have any
parents, where will he get the cash? Does he have a part-time job? The
confusion on my face must be obvious because when I go quiet; he looks up at me
and says, “Swimming competitions.
Lots and lots of them.
I’ve won enough money. I work at the Yacht Club.”
“Oh.
Then no
problem.
We can go to the shops and pick up one for you. Get you on a
plan.” I didn’t know you could win money swimming. Maybe I can, too?
“Just like
that?
You’ll get me one?” He jostles in his seat. His shoes tap on the
floor, and he blinks those thick lashes of his. “You’ll help me get a . . . a
smartphone?”
I seem to fall into the separate
specks in his eyes, but grin at his happy expression. “I need to apologise for
before, you know, about how I reacted when you said you hadn’t seen one. That
must have seemed rude.”
He sighs, falls back into his
seat and then keeps playing with the screens on my phone. His shoulders droop
and a lock of hair falls over his forehead. “
It’s
fine, Ellie.”
I scoot closer. “It’s not your
fault. Enough people must razz you about it.”
He smiles, but the expression
doesn’t move to his eyes. “Oh, but it is my fault. Don’t worry about it.”
What can he mean? It’s his fault
he’s an orphan and has never seen a smartphone? Anyway, I just don’t understand
how his friends never let him play with their phones. I feel terrible, but I
can’t ask him about his childhood, that is too personal considering how much
he’s trying to hide. “I’m meeting up with Bethany today at lunch. We can meet
you at the shops after school? We’ll get your phone then.”
“Today?”
“Why not?”
This time I grin directly into his eyes. “Life’s too short to waste time when
you know you want something. But it has to be after school. Mum will kill me if
I cut class.”
His thick eyebrows arch, mouth
parts and the lights in his eyes dazzle me. “Thank you, Eloise . . . Oh, wait.
Look—we’re here.”
I stare out the window to the
wide entry and gate with the sign
Keeper’s Butterflies
emblazoned in
gold on an iron plaque. Little wooden butterflies in colours of fading blue and
yellow offset the words.
The bus roars getting up the
curb. Gravel spits out from beneath the tyres, pinging against the underside of
the bus. The fields are lush and green, stretching out in rolling hills. White
and blue old Queenslanders come into view on a sprawling country estate with
huge sheds. We drive alongside a circular garden, arbour, and creeping pink
roses, then a wooden bench next to a myriad of flowers on thin stems.
“It’s beautiful,” Lakyn says next
to my left ear.
His warm breath caresses my skin,
and I shiver at the sensation. His body is oh-so-close to mine and my neck
tingles. “Yes.”
We go past what looks to be huge
greenhouses with tall plants, but the walls are made of green nets and then the
bus turns into another driveway. I glimpse diamond blue sea at the edge of the
yard. Smaller habitats form a line of green netted boxes, and a worker traipses
between them. Trees offer partial shade to the boxes, and the bus stops at the
end of the dirt driveway, parking beneath an old gum tree.
“Right, let’s get off,” Wacky
calls. “Form a line everyone.”
Lakyn grasps my hand before I can
do anything, and his long fingers engulf mine. He gently squeezes and then
touches my shoulder with his other hand. “Will you stay with me today? We can
be research partners.”
His voice slides across my ears
in a daring invitation. I nod, unable to speak around the lump in my throat. I
blink and rise from the seat, grabbing my backpack to stand in the aisle behind
him. The space isn’t wide enough for two to stand side by side.
Megan pushes me out of the way,
and I nearly fall over my loose sole, but she stops when she sees my hand in
Lakyn’s. Her gaze flashes up to my face and something unpleasant flits across
her eyes. “Freak,” she mouths.
I roll my eyes, turning away.
“Whatever.”
Lakyn immediately pivots to face
Megan, blocking her with his body. He seems to grow two feet taller, towering
over her. “I saw what you did in the window. Don’t ever talk to Ellie that way
again,” he says firmly.
Megan’s gaze flies above my
shoulders to him, and her mouth drops open as her composure falters. She falls
back a step and crosses her arms.
“Fine.”
She huffs
and looks away. “No accounting for taste.”
“Or lack of basic manners,” he
returns.
I giggle, trying to stifle the
sound with my fist, but no luck. As we leave the bus single file, I stare at
Lakyn’s tanned hand around mine and want to die of embarrassment. He’s cradling
my hand like he never intends to let me go.
16
WE EXIT THE school bus, ready to investigate the
butterflies, and the briny scent of the sea forces itself into my lungs in a
wash of pleasurable pain. Somewhere in my memory, the fresh, salty stream
lives, blasting against my face. Bubbles burst in my bloodstream.
Excitable, tiny things, which curl my toes in my shoes and urge me
to jump onto the sand and then allow the cool blue to sweep around my ankles.
My feet move toward the edge of
the rock wall, and the sand stretches white and pure, six feet below. I stall.
Surely
I can reach the bottom . . . but how?
Lakyn touches my arm. “What’s
wrong?”
The cliff is not terribly high,
just enough so that the fall will not kill me. I hope. The wind ruffles through
my hair, caressing the strands from my shoulders.
“Nothing,” I say in a low
monotone, my hand snug in his warm grip.
“Eloise,” he whispers, half
serious, half a gentle reminder. “Be careful. Do not get too close to the
edge.”
I clench my bottom lip between my
teeth and peer at our clasped hands and then back up to his face. Something
terrible twists inside my stomach and my heart aches.
“The
sea.”
Dark shadows flit across his
face. “Yes, I know. It’s one of the reasons I tried to bring you along to the
water in the first place. And now everyone else is here to witness your
reaction, rather than just me. Drop your bag under the tree with the others and
get your things,” he orders.
I blink, and then turn back to
the ocean, stunned by the blue before me.
The wide, sweeping
shoreline.
A fly closes in on my ear, and I swat it away. Time and space
are
the same thing and freeze with startling clarity.
“Eloise,” he barks. “You cannot
swim today.” He releases my hand to palm my shoulder, holding me in place.
“Maybe tomorrow.
Especially, after the last boy drowned.
Remember him . . . and I’ll need to get my gear. You can’t do it today. Please
listen to me.”
A ray of
sunlight spills across the trees and the green leaves dance in ripples of gold.
My heart swells. Cicadas burst into a frenetic buzz from the dry heat.
Tingles in my bloodstream envelope my skin, causing an unremitting
eagerness to shoot up my spine.
A hand lifts something from my shoulder,
plucking a weight from my back.
I turn to look, dumbfounded.
Lakyn grips the shoulder strap of
my bag and pins me with his gaze. “You are not going in the sea without me,” he
says. “I cannot risk it.” He points to the tree with all the other backpacks.
“Follow me, I mean it.”
I nod. He pulls open the zip and
retrieves my science book and leaflet, then hands me a pen. I curl the items
within my grasp, silently soaking up the scent of the sea. I don’t think he’ll
help me get there.
How can I get into the sea? Escape them all?
“You don’t want to fail this
class, right?” He grasps my hand again and tugs. “Follow me.”
I stand there, unable to move.
“OK.” He sighs, drops my bag and
then stalks in front of me, blocking out the halo of warmth from the sun. His height
overshadows the ocean, and instead of blue, all I see are black dots in front
of my eyes.
I blink and his warm musky scent
wraps around me. He grips my shoulders and then bends his head toward mine. I
shiver and focus in on his full bottom lip and his minty breath flowing across
my lips. For a second, which feels like a lifetime, I don’t know what he’s
doing, why he’s gazing at my mouth so intensely. Standing there for everyone to
see, and I can’t even stop him.
“Lakyn?”
I murmur.
“Hopefully, this works,” he
whispers.
Sunlight spills across his face,
and then the light starbursts between our mouths. But just when I think he will
kiss me, my heart hammers and he blows on my lips. His sweet, soft breath flows
across my skin, and I stare into his eyes the moment his lashes flick open and
the sunlight winks out between us.
Fire bursts in my face. The
sensation rushes up my skin, making every inch tingle. “What . . . are you
doing?” I moan.
He keeps blowing and I rear back,
stumbling over my sole, pressing my fingers on my mouth to confuse the nerve
endings.
“Stop!
What did you do?”
He steadies me with an iron grip
on my shoulders. “I snapped you out of it, Ellie.” Anger tosses in his blue
eyes, like a stormy sea. “This is the part where you say thank you.”
“Snapped me out of what?” I glare
at him in irritation.
“From looking at the sea?
Are
you mad? Why would you do that?” I ask incredulously, unable to help the hurt
leaking into my tone.
His sardonic blue eyes clash with
mine. The colour reflects the clouds, forming a silvery sheen on top of the
blue. He shakes his head and then pulls me over to the nets. “Forget about it.
You’re supposed to be my research partner, remember?” He gestures to the small
netted habitats. “I’ve never seen anything like this. Have a look and explain
them to me.”
I try to piece together what just
happened and his reasoning, but I can’t. The water catches my gaze again and I
stop. “I don’t want to look at the nets,” I mutter, struggling to hide my
bewilderment at his behaviour. His nearness is both exciting and disturbing. I
think I’ll replay the moment his lips almost touched mine every night for the
rest of my life.
After a long pause, his voice
barks firm and final. “This is not up for discussion.”
“Says who?
You?”
A quirk of his lips morphs into a
fully formed grin. He chuckles. “Don’t like that idea?”
I
fold
my arms across my chest, levelling my gaze on him.
The smile drops a little from his
face and then he sucks in a breath. His eyes swim with an unspoken emotion, a
darker blue, and the seriousness on his face speaks to the gravity of his plea.
“Please. Come away from the water. Don’t go in there yet.”
I blink at his expression and
sigh, looking down at my shoes, wondering why I’m fighting so hard. Finally, I
follow his lead and wander over to the habitat that holds caterpillars in the
midst of forming cocoons. I squeeze past other students to get a glimpse of a
wriggling black body. The puffy segments expand and then contract, rippling
along the entire length of the caterpillar.
I open my leaflet and begin to
fill out the sections. I can’t figure out which end of the caterpillar is
which.
Head or tail?
Then the blackness splits, the
caterpillar jolts from side to side and a white opaque goo balloons out from
the bottom. It looks like it’s vomiting a
sac
.
“Oh, my God.”
I moan a little.
“Let’s move on to the next one.”
Lakyn hurriedly pulls me along. “Write that bit in later.” He laughs again.
In a clear bowl
nearer the garden, large green leaves help hide greyish cocoons.
There
are heaps of them inside, all in various stages. Lakyn’s warm palm sends
shivers up my arm and down my spine. A silly grin curves my lips, but I act
cool, peering closer as part of the grey shell breaks. The green of the garden
shines through the small diamond squares of net, and the leaves blur at corner
of my eyes. Then thin legs push out from inside the hard shell, breaking free.
Golden orange wings expand, and the cocoon snaps, releasing the butterfly.
I suck in a breath. The wings
flutter to the edge of the bowl, up to the roof.
“Amazing.”
Lakyn releases my hand and
presses his palms against the net, his nose almost as close. “Ellie . . .
what’s happening?”
The butterfly pushes off and
rests near his fingertips. His eyes widen and lips part. With all the other
students laughing and talking in the background, Lakyn is utterly entranced.
The leaves rustle in the trees around us, but his gaze never swerves from the
butterfly.
He suddenly pushes his fingers
through the net. “Come here,” he croons.
Wings flutter and thin legs push
off, then the butterfly lands on his index finger. “I’ve never seen anything
like this before.” His voice wobbles. “What do they do?”
“Butterflies?”
I ask, smiling. “Fly.”
“Incredible.”
“Yes.” I sigh at the mystery of
life. “The butterfly was inside of the caterpillar the whole time. You just
couldn’t see it.”
He points to the other boxes of
nets with black, furry caterpillars.
“Inside of them?
Then they transform into this.” He looks off into the distance, as though he’s looking
at a memory from a faraway place.
“Sometimes, I feel caught like
that butterfly,” I say. “Like I’m stuck somewhere, and if I can get through
that, the best part is yet to happen. Like this part is the dream.”
“What will your best part look
like?” he asks with a smile. The butterfly lifts up into the air and he follows
it with his gaze.
“It’s what it will feel like.” I
stare at the rest of the butterflies trapped inside their cocoons. “It will
feel incredible. Like what that butterfly must’ve felt bursting free.”
“That day might come sooner than
you think.”