The Fall of Butterflies (17 page)

O
kay, we need to talk about Milo. I do not think it's an exaggeration to say that he is kind of slowly but surely killing me and killing my heart.

He is not trying to.

No, Milo does not seem like the kind of guy who would try to hurt anyone, ever, for any reason. In fact, before dinner I noticed he saw a spider in the entryway and he made everyone move out of the way so he could catch the spider, put a piece of paper under it and a shot glass above it, and deliver said spider kindly, gently, into the great outdoors. So, yeah, Milo is not a harm doer, spider killer, or feelings hurter.

Nevertheless! Nevertheless, Milo is turning my head into
jelly and goop because all I can do is think that I shouldn't get a crush on him but I'm getting a crush on him but I shouldn't get a crush on him but maybe he's getting a crush on me but maybe he isn't but maybe he is, otherwise, why would I even be here amid this menagerie of ridiculous names?

By the way, I'm not even going to tell you about the last names. You know what they are, right? What they've got to be? I can only imagine it goes something like: DuPont, Peabody, Carnegie, Picklebottom, Tiffany. Lobstertails. I am not going to ask. Because you and I both know when they say them it's going to be real hard to keep a straight face.

There is a lot of talk about the next round in these here festivities. A lot of shuffling around, trying to attain the right lighting and music. I'd always heard that people who take drugs are unmotivated. Lazy. Layabouts. But if you take into consideration the time and effort Tad and Muffy and, yes, even Milo, are putting into curating and achieving their drug-related experiences, I believe you'd have to beg to differ.

And while this is going on? I'm tiptoeing around, taking it all in.

You know how, back in the day, if you went over to Saddam Hussein's house he had gold chairs, gold faucets, gold toilets? And everything had that same tapestry fabric
and then gold on the side of it? Like the whole place was designed to scare you with money. Well, this place is the opposite of that.

This is the kind of place where everything is just so. Small, delicate, intricate, never pointing at itself.

That nautical ship. That mother-of-pearl snuffbox. That Wedgwood ashtray. That Willow Ware vase. That silver engraved pocket watch. That scrimshaw whale tooth. That ivory-handled envelope opener from Nepal.

It's a good thing the drug we are doing is not LSD. If the drug we are doing were LSD, then I'd really be getting lost in this exquisite exhibition of curiosities. As it is, the curiosities are appreciated but not a source of a trip-the-light-fantastic romp I go into in my imagination for the next twelve hours.

And now Milo has come to fetch me.

“Ready?”

“I guess.” My frown disagrees.

He takes my hand gently. “Hey. What is it?”

“I just—um, why are we doing this?”

He looks at me like,
Doing what?

I stare, pointedly, at the pills in his other hand.

“Wait, really?” he asks.

And I know I'm supposed to be enigmatic and inscrutable and mysterious and asking this question is none of those things. I know that. But there is that mouth problem I have.

There it is. I feel my Willa brain revving up, readying all the words, all the thoughts I have to muster. And here it comes, attack of the big mouth—

“I just . . . I feel like this place, and that food, and these things and
that boat
and all of it . . . It's just so incredible, and nobody gets to see these things, or
I
never got to, not before this. And you—this is like
your life
, you know? And, I mean, isn't it all amazing enough? Isn't it all just the dream everyone has? And you are living it! And now I'm here living this little piece of it. So isn't that enough? I mean. I'm asking. I'm just . . . asking.”

He stares at me. Blinks once, twice.

Oh God. My cheeks blaze hot and red. I have totally, completely blown it.

“I'll just go now,” I say, “before the tide turns. You think I can borrow a bathing suit?” I move for the hallway.

“Willa, wait.” Milo squeezes my hand tighter and pulls me deeper into the house. We sit next to each other in the stairwell, on the dark, Persian runner–covered steps. The moonlight is filtering its first rays through the leaded windows in the front of the house.

Milo takes a deep breath.

“Listen. I don't know what you see when you look at all of this. I guess I never thought about it. I didn't mean to freak you out. I just . . . hoped you'd like it. But I grew up here, you
know? Every summer, me and my mother and Kitty and my dad. We'd come here. And yeah, I guess I know it's special. But it's also just all I know. And the thing is, Willa, all of this”—he holds his arms out wide—“doesn't make anything better. Or more okay. I mean, don't be insulted. But believe me when I say none of
this
keeps out the horrible things. You know what I mean?”

I open my mouth to argue, but close it again when I see the faraway look in Milo's eyes.

“My father was a good guy, you know? But he was working for some really bad guys. And when he found out how bad they were, how many people they'd stolen from, how many lives they'd ruined, it was like he couldn't take it.”

And now it feels like even the moon is listening.

“I found him.”

“What?”

“I was the one who found my dad.”

My heart feels like it's squeezing in on itself. My stomach becomes a black hole. “Oh, Milo. That is so terrible.”

“I know. I just thought you should know because . . . well, everybody knows. And since then it's like I've kind of got this scarlet letter.”

“No. Milo, no. Everybody thinks you're sort of God's gift to the world. Honestly! I mean, you should hear Remy talking about you.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Hm.”

“Does that surprise you? I thought you guys were friends.”

“Yeah, um . . . Remy can be hard to read sometimes.”

“You're telling me.”

He kind of nods. There's a smile here, but a sad little smile. Something pondering.

“Look, I'm sorry to have brought it up. But I guess what I'm trying to say is, people think having all this is the key, right? To happiness? But there is no key. I think . . . maybe there's just whatever gets handed to you. So if you want to know
why
”—he looks down at the fist holding the pills—“I don't know. My feeling is, why not, you know? Why. The hell. Not?”

And I am left wondering the exact same thing.

Did you know when you do Molly you automatically fall in love with the person next to you? True story.

Yes, I said I was never gonna do anything like that again but, right now, I'm just falling in love with Milo. Because he happens to be next to me. And I know it's not real, I know it's just the chemicals, but it seems like, right now, at this instant, Milo is in love with me, too. Like this thing is
reciprocal. And I'm not crazy.

“Do you know why I showed up that day?”

“What day?”

“That audition day?”

We're not exactly on the sofa, we're more on the floor, leaning against the sofa and looking into each other's eyes swimming all over the place.

“No. Wait, yes! Because you love
the theater
.”

“Wrongo.”

He smiles. “Wrongo” is what I say. And now he says it. We're speaking the same language! We're making up a new language—that's how in love we are!

“Okay, why?”

“Because Remy said she'd met the coolest girl from Iowa who she wished she could go out with, but she couldn't 'cause she's not a lesbo, so I had to so she could live vicariously through me.”

We look at each other, still smiling, eyes swimming.

“Wait . . . okay, this is a dumb question, but . . . um, forget it. I don't want
to ruin the moment
or whatever.” I can't help myself.

“What is it? You won't. Seriously.”

Milo looks at me, and I am about to jump into his eyes any second.

“We're not
going out
, are we? I mean, we're just doing
whatever this is. On a private island. Somewhere on the Eastern Seaboard.”

Milo smiles. Across from us, in front of the fireplace, Paige, Igby, and Cricket are doing what could only be described as a kind of modern primitive dance. At this moment it seems that Paige is some sort of goddess figure who Igby and Cricket seem to be paying tribute to.

“Why, does that offend you?” Milo says, teasing.

“What? The goddess dance over there?”

“No. The going out . . . with me . . . thing?”

Honestly, I don't know what to say to this. Part of me wants to say no and throw myself around him and tell him he's the most superamazing being on the planet, but part of me wants to say nothing and cry and crawl into a hole because I have no self-esteem. Of course, the Molly is helping with that.

Milo is waiting for an answer, but I'm too busy not knowing what to say.

“To be honest with you, Willa, I don't care what you say.”

“Oh?”

“Because I'm gonna make you my girlfriend, no matter what.”

“Um.”

“I don't care if it takes a year and I have to jump through a zillion hoops and call the president. You are gonna be my
girlfriend, Willa. You have no choice.”

“Um.”

And now his eyes light up, and it's a spooky voice. “Surrender, Suuuureeendeeer, Willa . . .”

He's making Svengali hand gestures at me, trying to reel me into his magical whirling eyes.

“Beeeeee miiiiiiiine . . .”

“Okay can I ask you a question?”

“Yeeeeeessss.”

“Do you say that stuff to, like, all the girls?”

“Yeeeeeessss. I have a harem baaaaack hooome in my ciiiiircussss tent.”

Oh my God, I don't know what to do with Milo. I want to attack him. I want to attack him with kisses.

Even though, basically, I don't even know how to kiss.

Oh God, please don't tell anybody I told you that.

It's so embarrassing. But, for realz, what am I even supposed to do here? I mean, if Milo tries to full-on make out with me, I'd bet I'd be, like, the worst kisser, like a dragon kisser, and then next thing you know he'd tell everybody and I'd be laughed off the island and they'd probably just force me to swim to the mainland. The mainland.

I'm at a place where you say “the mainland.”

“Willa?”

“Milo?”

“You don't have to answer me. You don't have to think. Or worry. Or do anything you don't want to. You just have to be here now. With me.”

And I'm looking up at Milo and in the background the weird dance is transforming and I'm thinking to myself,
no one has ever said that to me
. No one has ever let me off the hook.

What if that was all it meant to be in love? That you just let the other person off the hook. That it's okay and nothing has to be like it's
supposed to be
, like everybody says it's supposed to be? And everything can just be what it is. And that's okay.

“Milo?”

“Yes?”

“How many girlfriends have you had?”

“One. In the future. Her name is Willa.”

T
here's something I have to tell you. Can you keep a secret? I kind of did something weird last week that nobody knows about but I kind of did it on a whim. A suggested whim. I don't know. I think my body got taken over by demons or something and the next thing I know I was downloading forms and filling out paperwork and getting letters of recommendation and visiting Wharton House and checking in with Ms. Ingall and writing essays and all sorts of boring stuff that is really annoying and takes forever, but something just made me do it. Maybe it was a ghost. An academic ghost.

Or maybe it was just Ms. Ingall.

Maybe she spiked my tea.

Don't tell anyone, okay? Don't tell Remy. Don't tell Milo. Especially not my mother. Definitely not. Not anyone. Not even my dad. I don't know why I have to keep it a secret, but I do. I guess I don't want to be a laughingstock or something. When I fail. If I fail. Which . . . I probably will.

Okay, here it is.

I applied to Berkeley.

On my own.

Shh.

I said don't tell!

Really, I just don't want to feel like an idiot, okay? I just don't want to feel like I tried for this big, totally unlikely thing and didn't get it and then everybody will make fun of me and laugh at me or, worse, feel sorry for me. So, just don't tell anyone. I'm not getting in, okay? It's just a Hail Mary. Just a
what the heck
.

Just a shot in the dark.

I
really didn't think I'd see Remy before class today. Monday morning is always this bumbling rush of people, half-asleep, trying to make it to Con Lit or Calculus or Chemistry. But, as I was coming out of the campus center, scrambling to get it together, between my iced latte, my backpack, and my books, Remy appeared.

“Willa. I have to talk to you.”

She's next to me now, as we rush across the green.

“Um, do you think we could talk after class 'cause I feel like I really need to talk to you, too, but I can't right now 'cause I'm superlate.”

There are a zillion things to tell her. Mainly about Milo and the private island and my heart and what to do with it.

“Yeah, of course. No problem. By the way, I slept with Humbert Humbert.”

Okay, this stops me.

“You what?!”

“Humbert Humbert. He's mine!”

“Remy, that is so . . . fucked!”

She smirks. “Don't you mean
I
am so fucked?”

“No, I mean
he
is so fucked. Like, he's fucked in the head, and he's fucked in his career.”

“Career?”

“Yes, Remy. He's an English teacher. Don't be a snob.”

“Well, he could be so much more.”

“Like what, like Mr. Remy Taft?”

She doesn't answer.

“Okay, that's it. I am officially quitting the play. You tell Humbert.”

“What? Why?”

“Because he's a perv, and I can't risk him molesting me.”

“Come on. Besides, what am I even supposed to say?”

“I don't know. Tell him I died.”

“Seriously?”

“Tell him . . . I'm allergic . . . to theater. And rapists.”

“C'mon, be nice. I need you. I'm feeling kind of vulnerable.”

And now I see it. Remy is standing there, in her full
adorable weird mismatched outfit, looking at me, and there it is. She's scared.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, like . . . I'm feeling kind of . . . I dunno, weird.”

“Remy, okay. I want to talk to you about this and I don't want you to feel weird, but I also can't miss class. So, let me just, I guess I'll just drop by later. Okay . . . ?”

“Okay.” But she is . . . Is she shaking?

“Um, you're okay, right?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine.”

“Okay, I'll see you after class.”

Walking off, I turn around. Remy is just standing there. “Wait, why aren't you going to class?”

“Oh, I kinda just don't have, like, anything to hand in, so . . .”

“So you're just not going to class?”

“Well, I don't really feel very well.”

“Remy, just go to class.”

“I'm sick.”

And this is such a ludicrous self-diagnosis. Obviously, she's not sick. Obviously, she just doesn't want to go. Obviously, she just wants to sit there and pine over Humbert Humbert.

“Remy. If you go to class, it might take your mind off things. Like, it will distract you and you'll feel better.”

“Mmm . . . I don't think so.”

“Fine. I'll see you later.”

There's the clock tower at the end of the cloisters, and I have about thirty seconds to make it across the green into Royce Hall. I can do it. I can do it because I think I can do it and I must do it.

Persevere, Willa!

I could think about Remy standing there behind me fucking everything up or I could think about the fact that I seem to be becoming obsessed with Milo or I could think about the fact that the world is a horrible, unjust place, but none of that is gonna help me make it into the classroom before that bell.